Now normally Owen Hart would spend a Friday night with his parents. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you see it, this was not a normal Friday night. Owen’s parents had left for a long work trip on Wednesday and had refused to take him with them, they hadn’t wanted him to miss that much school and he was old enough to take care of himself for a while. 

It was just past 8:00 pm and Owen had just finished cleaning the kitchen after dinner when, suddenly, something shifted. Owen didn’t even know how to describe what had changed specifically, other than the fact that he suddenly felt like he had to go somewhere. No, not just anywhere, the forest. 

As soon as the thought hit him it felt obvious. Of course he needed to go to the forest. Except that wasn’t normal. But he couldn’t just not go, that would be UNACCEPTABLE, so he had to leave. 

He decided, however, that he would not just go with nothing on him. Owen quickly gathered a small, spare backpack, and filled it with two flashlights, a bottle of water, his wallet, and a random bag of trail mix he found in a cabinet. After shoving on his shoes, he snatched his keys to the house and headed to the door.

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Exiting the house he locked the door behind himself and started walking towards the forest. Luckily it was just across the street.

Owen happened to live at the end of the neighborhood right next to the forest. The neighborhood was rather closed off and wasn’t ventured down often, at least not all the way to the end. Similarly this part of the forest was not a popular place, with only a few trails for the few hikers who walked them. 

The neighborhood was mostly quiet, with faint music coming from a few houses down the street, as Owen crossed the street and walked into the forest. 

He only stopped for a brief moment to grab one of his flashlights. Even then, the pause in his mission seemed to feel almost suffocating. It was as if stopping now, when he was so close, was dangerous, forbidden.

He seemed to have found a path, although he didn’t remember one being here. Perhaps he just didn’t know where the trails were? He didn’t exactly have the best memory, and it wasn’t like he went out here often. Something told him that he was just making excuses.

After a good 5 minutes of walking on the path, the trail led right into a clearing. The clearing was filled with short green grass and small flowers. There was even an seemingly abandoned stone birdbath to the far left side of the clearing. 

He stepped out towards the middle of the clearing. As he reached the middle of the clearing he realized that this was where he was supposed to go. 

He only had a moment to ask himself why he had bothered to come here in the first place when the forest Spoke.