"Grayson, you listen to me right no-"

Gray slammed the door shut in his father's face, and locked it.

"Not right now, Dad!" Then he pulled out his headphones, and drowned out his father's pounding in hard rock.

He can wait.

He knew he could wait. Gray could outwait his father any day. Hell, he practically did it everyday.

The rest of school had gone by without a hitch, really, after the cops left.

Micheal's father showed up and took him home for the day. And Grayson was questioned about his whereabouts during the act. But it was a minor problem, solved simply by Micheal assuring them all that he hadn't been thrown from the rooftop. So Gray was granted permission to return to class, where he was promptly chewed out by Ms. Shaunasee.

He probably shouldn't have been. Gray felt like he should have been rewarded for doing the right thing. But, then again, he hadn't really done anything. He didn't stop Micheal from jumping. He couldn't even explain how his classmate was still alive. So he just kept quiet.

Nobody even knew the two of them had been on the roof, aside from Crystal.

And Crystal kept demanding to know what happened up there. But Gray wasn't really ready to try and explain everything to her, considering the fact that he didn't even understand it himself. So he just waved her off, and spent the rest of the day in silence.

Gray flopped out on top of his covers and shot a text to Bret: Yo my dads losing it again and I might be too bro you wanna

Out of nowhere, Gray's phone was snatched out of his hand, and he was left staring back into his father's heated gaze.

"How'd you get in here?" He jumped, yanking an earbud out.

"I own this house, Gray. I have a key to everything. And I payed for this phone, so technically it's mine, too,"

"You can't do that!" Gray jumped up and snatched at it. But his Dad held it well out of reach.

"Watch me. We're moving. Like it or not. So pack,"

"I'm going out with friends," Gray spat, shouldering past his father, and grabbing his wallet.

"Your friends can come here and watch you pack," Dad replied, confiscating the wallet as well.

"How? You have my phone,"

"You're a creative kid, Gray. You'll figure something out," his father said. Then he marched out, shaking his head and grumbling. "Damn text doesn't even have a single comma in it,"

Gray slammed his door again and locked it with force, as if that'd keep his father out for good. And for a moment he just stared daggers at the door, muttering responses he'd never actually use to his father's face.

He'd lived here all his life. Yeah, he didn't want to lose the few friends he had, Bret and Crystal (if she really counted), or his place at the table by the garbage cans. Gray didn't want to have to start all over, somewhere new.

But mostly he just didn't want to be somewhere new. He wanted to be here, where he grew up. Where his mother had been.

He had no memories in whatever shabby apartment in Miami he was being forced to live in. All of those were here. And the next person to have this house wouldn't even know it. They'd never know how special it was.

Gray grabbed one of the empty boxes that had been filling up the corner of his room for a couple of weeks, and wandered around aimlessly. To be completely honest, Grayson had absolutely no idea where to start the task of untangling his past. It felt like he was untying an old knot, just trying to find that one loose end to pull that would make everything come apart.

Eventually he slid open the top drawer of his bedside table, and began to pack away his books. It's not like he ever read books anyway. Grayson hadn't read a book since he got his phone. And he hadn't read a good book since long before then.

Then, as Gray got to the bottom of the drawer, he stopped short.

Stuffed, all the way in the back corner, was a little walkie talkie.

He looked out the window and stared at the empty house across the street. Luke hadn't lived in the house in ten years.

Gray still remembered, after Luke had moved away, laying in his bed, staring out the window at the empty building. Just listening to static, and whispering into the dead signal. Waiting for his friend to reply.

It wasn't until he was sixteen that he got his first phone. And the first thing Gray did was look up his old friend.

It took him a while to find him, it turned out he went by Lucas now instead of Luke, and his last name was spelled slightly different than the way Gray remembered it. But his face never really changed. Lucas lived in Arizona, graduated highschool two years early and was currently in college with a girlfriend, and eight hundred followers.

Gray had debated DMing him, asking if he remembered his old friend, but deep down he couldn't find the will.

Luke had grown up now. He was in a relationship, in college, a thousand miles away. And Gray was still here. Never really changed. Just the same old kid in the same old place. Lucas had done so much. Why would he remember his best friend from when he was eight? Why would he care?

So Gray left it alone. But he couldn't help but give the trigger one last click, and listen to the static again, before throwing it in the trash.

The world had left Grayson Ritcher behind. And he wasn't sure if he would to be able to catch back up.

Giving up on this half of the room, Gray closed his curtains and headed towards his closet. Let's just play it safe with some old clothes. He thought, pulling pants off of the shelf.

"There's nothing on the top shelf, right?" Gray wondered aloud. Swiping his arm blindly over the shelf above, and knocking old Legos down on top of his head. Grayson's hand touched the cover of the old book, and it sent chills down his spine.

Gray pulled the book down from the shelf, and hesitantly wiped off it's rough surface. He traced the skull in the center of the cover, and slowly opened it up to the last bookmarked page.

The nostalgic cracking of the spine as it opened, and the smell of the pages that'd been flipped by the same fingers a thousand times over, filled the room. It was suffocating. It was too much. All of it.

Hands shaking uncontrollably, Gray dropped the book on the floor and stumbled out of his room, tears in his eyes. He never noticed a single sheet of notebook paper flutter out of it's pages, and skid under the bed.

Gray kept his face down as he marched past his father. "I'm going for a walk," he grumbled.

Mr. Ritcher slammed his coffee cup down on the counter, in frustration. "You've been procrastinating for months now Grayson! It needs to stop! You have to pack,"

"I'm trying, Dad," Gray cried, rounding on his father. His voice cracked when he repeated himself: "I'm trying,"

Mr. Ritcher stared at his son for a minute, then lowered his gaze. "Yeah. I haven't packed our closet yet either," he smiled.

A smile of heartache. The closet is where his Dad kept all of his mother's stuff. When Gray was little he used to sneak in when his father was away and look through her pictures.

Packing must have been harder for him than it was for Gray. Having to dig through pile after pile of reminders of everything that he'd lost. His one heart and soul.

"Your Grandfather is coming by later," Mr. Ritcher reminded Gray, clearing his throat. "Be back soon. Your phone's on the table," He wiped his face and disappeared into the bedroom.

Gray looked down at his phone on the table... and left it there as he stepped out into the fresh air.

It'd been a long time since he'd gone anywhere without a phone in his hand, let alone without a phone on him. And his brain kept telling him to go back.

What if someone texts you and you don't see it?

But he never stopped. He never turned back. If, for once, someone needed him, they'd have to need him enough to find him first.

Gray kept walking, and walking, and walking, until he didn't know where he was anymore. And then he kept walking. He walked through the trees at the back of his yard and headed into the woods, without a plan in mind. He just needed to get away. Someplace dirty, and maybe a little primal. A place where the silence wouldn't be so deafening. A place that didn't feel like it'd grown up without him.

Gray stopped suddenly, just short of running face first into a tree trunk.

"I guess that's why you can't stare at the ground when you're walking alone," he announced to absolutely nobody.

Crack!

Gray spun around at the sound and scanned the trees.

"Who's there?"

Silence. Nothing moved.

That gnawed at his nerves more than anything. Wouldn't a bird or dog have just run away? Flee instead of risk getting caught?

Who keeps following me?

As Gray glanced around, something caught his eye. A little further up the hill, there was a tree. It had big red leaves... in the middle of winter.

It was the Red Tree. His Red Tree.

Every fear slid free of his mind as Gray stumbled up to his old friend in awe. It hadn't changed at all. It was exactly as he'd remembered it.

Gray tread carefully over the thick grass, allowing it to squish beneath his shoes. He walked up and patted the tree's trunk, slowly circling it.

"...within their shell of stone, frozen in time. Some say that they still sit there-" Gray whispered, in his very own story voice.

How did I make it back here? He came around the side and mounted the Red Tree's lowest branch. Then looked up at the sky.

He could almost hear her again. Almost.

There were so many questions that he finally wanted to ask. He finally felt safe asking, but he knew he'd still never get the answers he needed. Because there was nobody left to give them to him.

He closed his eyes and tried to melt up into the Red Tree. The one thing that, in ten years, had changed less than he had.

"Gray?"

He jumped and nearly slid sideways off of the branch. Gray caught himself with one of his flailing limbs, and spun towards the voice.

"Crystal?"

Crystal bounded over to where he was sitting, and Gray became a little more guarded the closer that she got closer. It felt like she was invading his memories or something. This place was sacred to him. Nobody was allowed there except for his mother and himself.

"What are you doing here?" Gray snapped.

Crystal froze, taken aback by his harsh tone. "I don't know, I was just walking. And I saw you. So I came over. Why didn't you answer my texts?"

"Because I left my phone at home,"

"Why'd you leave your phone, silly?"

To spare myself the pleasure of your company.

"Why didn't you answer when I yelled 'who's there'?" He retorted, ignoring his preferred response.

"I didn't hear you," she shrugged, then glanced around. "What is this place?"

"The only place I can go to be alone," Gray replied, hinting profusely.

"Oh," she looked at the Big Drop. "Whoa, what's this?"

Gray leapt off of the branch, and seized Crystal's arm. "Be careful! You can't go down there!"

"Why not? It's just a forest, Gray," she glared at him. "What's going on with you, lately?"

"I just need some air,"

"You've been avoiding me for months! How much air do you need?"

"More than you're letting me have,"

"Are you hiding something, Gray?"

"No. I-"

"You are!"

"It's complicated,"

"Tell me, Gray,"

"I'm busy. I'm-"

"Just tell me!"

"Why can't you just go home?"

That's when the world blew up around them.

The ground exploded beneath their feet, like a hidden landmine had been triggered. Force threw the couple up in the air, and gravity brought them crashing right back down, over the Big Drop.

Gray hit the ground and then fell ten more feet. All in all probably a total of a thirty foot drop from his peak after the explosion.

Aching and disoriented, Gray sat up with a grimace, and coughed. Dirt landed in chunks around him, and it took several minutes for the dust to settle.

"Crystal?" He called.

Crystal rolled over and sat up a few feet away from him, emptying the dirt from her lungs.

Gray took note of his surroundings. They were in some sort of underground tunneling system, and the "ground" above him was less than an inch thick. Gray could stick his fingers up through it like some zombie in a horror movie if he really wanted to.

He took a step back and tried to peer up at where they'd been standing, to see what had happened. But he wasn't tall enough.

Gray reached for his phone to call his Dad.

Shit. I left it at home. How the hell are we gonna get out of here? Gray wondered. "Crystal, I need your phone,"

"I don't... have... a phone," she wheezed slowly.

The ground wasn't that far up, he could probably jump and grab it, but there was no way it would hold his weight long enough for him to climb back onto solid ground.

Grayson glanced down the tunnel. It probably didn't go to the surface, but... what if there was something valuable down there? Was he just going to leave and let someone else find it? Besides, if they weren't getting out anytime soon, might as well go adventuring. Maybe they would find a ladder or something.

"Let's go this way," he suggested, helping Crystal to her feet. She merely nodded between coughs, and caught onto his shirt sleeve.

Gray touched the wall, and began walking down the dark, underground, hallway, keeping his eyes peeled for signs of danger. What he didn't expect to see, up ahead, was a light.

"Wait, that's it?" Gray asked aloud, unimpressed. "I got blasted down a mysterious hole in the ground, and all I find is an exit? Are you kidding me?"

Crystal cleared her throat. "Ahem. Don't you mean we?" But Gray didn't even hear her.

Part of him debated going back, checking for a passage or something that he'd missed, but who was he kidding? This wasn't Narnia.

Instead, he sighed and jogged towards the light. Then he froze in place, causing Crystal to slam into him from behind.

In front of them wasn't an exit, like he had expected. It was a well lit room. The walls were covered in ivy and moss, the floor was smooth. Natural light flooded in through unseen cracks in the ceiling. But that wasn't what caught Gray's breath.

Because, in the center of the room, stood the two, stone, statues, of Dare and Scary.

"Whoa," Gray stepped up close to Dare and cautiously stroked his stone face. "Someone really liked that old story... and had a lot of time on their hands,"

"Story?" Crystal echoed. She hung back in the doorway, somewhat unnerved by the creepy statues.

"The Skelitin Saga," Gray gazed into Dare's maniacal face, and took a step to the side.

Dare was leaning backwards, his wand pointing straight into the chest of, none other than, Scott "Scary" Skelitin.

In a way, Gray was a bit starstruck. Even though it was just a carving of his absolute favorite character in all of literature. He'd never had the chance to see him portrayed like this. The book had no illustrations. And, unfortunately, wasn't very popular, so there wasn't even that much fun art online.

"What's the Skelitin Saga?"

"Just the greatest book ever written," Gray whispered. "It's about these big bad guys who are all hunting down Scary Skelitin and his allies to kill them, because they're the last remaining soldiers in a long forgotten resistance.

"I kinda imagined you a little older," Gray muttered, leaning towards Scary's statue. The looked no older than 22 or so, rather than the imagined, 28 or 30.

Grayson reached out a hand, and scratched a white spot off of it's nose.

CRACK!

A huge split ran up Scary's face from the spot Gray had scraped.

"Oh shit, ohshit," Gray covered his mouth. "I just broke it,"

CRACK! CRACK!! CRACK!!!

The section of Scary's face, from his nose to his left ear, fell off of the statue. Gray's reflexes kicked in, seizing the rubble before it could hit the ground. "Maybe I can glue-"

Then he saw it. Under the layer of stone he'd just broken off... was a layer of flesh.

"Gray?" Crystal squealed. Raw panic filled her eyes as she backed up against the wall of the cave.

Piece after piece of Scary's statue crumbled and fell to the Earth, slowly exposing the human beneath.

Gray stared, bug eyed and clueless, as the stranger shook the dirt and rocks off of his clothes, and looked up at them.

For a moment, he just blinked... then realization hit Scary's eyes. He pointed his wand at Gray's chest. "Move,"

"Wh-what?"

"MOVE!" Scary flicked his wrist and sent Gray stumbling back against the cave wall. Then he threw down his fist in anger, sending a shower of fire and sparks at the dirt. "DAMMIT!"

Gray looked back towards the entrance, where Scary had been aiming, and noticed a pile of stone and dirt, strewn across the ground.

If this guy was actually Scary Skelitin, one of the greatest wizards of all time, and he was actively preforming magic, shooting fire and throwing people... That meant that Gray had freed him.

And with Scary, he'd also freed one of the most maniacal, heartless, savage, villains of all time along with him.

And sure enough, Dare was already gone...