"Thanks for the ride," Nicholas says, climbing into the new-ish, green, four door sedan. Darius, seated at the steering wheel, offers a nod and waits for his friend to take a seat before putting the vehicle into drive and hitting the accelerator, heading for the exit to Nicholas's cul-de-sac. "No problem. I thought about having Sophia drive, but we couldn't find the books she sits on to see over the dashboard."

"Hey! Jerk!" Sophia yells out, leveling a firm slap at Darius's shoulder. "If this is how it's going to be all night, you might as well take me home."

"You're the one making us go to this thing," Nicholas says, glancing back at her, the smaller female seated in the middle backseat. "I already had plans for tonight."

"Oh pfft," Sophia responds. "Like what? Staying home and playing video games?"

"Exactly. Now I have to go to some party and babysit."

"Babysit?" Sophia frowns, crossing her arms, although not for long. She smiles and her lower lip quivers as she feigns sadness. "Aww," she teases. "Are you worrying about me, Nick?"

"I just don't want you to get drunk and do something stupid."

"Who said I was going to drink? I just want to, y'know..."

"See the sights?" Darius grins, eyes still on the road.

"Or the guys," Nicholas continues, his own grin slowly appearing.

"The guys are the sights. What else is there for a girl to see at midnight out in the woods?" Darius cackles playfully, leaning forward to avoid another slap aimed at his shoulder. "Hey!"

"If homicide were legal you two would be my first targets," Sophia huffs, adjusting her glasses before folding her arms across her chest. "Can you focus on the road so we don't die?"

Her attention shifts to the darkness outside the car window, broken occasionally by the yellow glow of street lamps. The road they're on leads them onto a darkened boulevard, which at this time of night is eerily empty. After some time, the pavement ends and they find themselves on a dirt road toward a gloomy forest.

As the rocks begin to crunch beneath the car's tires, and the road turns to gravel, Darius flips on the brights on his vehicle to stave off the darkness. Had the three not been so jovial in their anticipation of the party, the spookiness of the shadows cast by the trees might have kept them on edge. It's not until they spot the vehicles of the other party-goers, as well as the brilliant lights from fires and flood lights in the forest, that Darius pulls over and slows down to a stop. All three climb out of the car, and Sophia quickly rushes on ahead as the light stretches far enough into the woods to make walking a safe option.

"Sophia!" Nicholas calls out, climbing out of the car and watching her speed away.

"Let her go, Nick," Darius says, patting his friend on the shoulder. "She's not a little girl anymore."

With a chuckle, the two men follow along at a more casual pace; Darius is met with cheers from fellow schoolmates as the two enter the firelight. The campsite had clearly been set up several hours in advance, with several tents pitched. Numerous coolers stand open, with various kinds of drinks settled into the melting ice inside. Beside the fires, a few flood lamps have been set up, hooked to generators. Most of them have been turned outward, into the forest, to ward off any potential predators.

Seats of all kinds have been set up, most fully occupied, ranging from fold out chairs to old logs. A few teenagers choose to stand, but they've all created their own cliques to speak with one another. Each group must speak louder to be heard over the din of the generators and the loud music coming from phones and radios set up in each corner. Because the music from each source is different, it creates a confusing cacophony that makes it difficult to appreciate what's playing on each one. Even so, no-one seems to notice and, if they do, they clearly don't care.

Only a single girl is seated by her lonesome, away from the crowd. Her brown hair, drifting just beyond shoulder length judging by how it spills out of the front of her hoodie, fits perfectly with her hazel eyes. The grey hoodie is zipped all the way up to hide her top and pulled up over her head. She'd blend into a crowd of teenagers quite easily, had she not chosen to sit away from everyone.

Finding nothing else better to do with his friends now out and about, Nicholas moves to approach the timid girl, noting her vague familiarity. Close enough to catch her attention so his presence isn't a surprise, he waves lightly to her and offers a half smile. "Hey."

The girl looks over and returns the gesture, nodding at him. "Hey."

It's obvious the girl is shy, but not entirely unwilling to speak. Though whether it's because she has no other choice, or because she's simply trying to be nice, Nicholas can only guess.

He gets closer. "Sarah, right?"

The girl nods, holding on to that weak smile, fidgeting with her fingers in her lap.

"Thought I'd say hello," says Nicholas, trying to sound friendly.

There is a slight pause. She looks away at the campfire, momentarily adverse to looking at the boy speaking to her. "Thanks."

Nicholas crosses his arms and walks a little closer. "I'm Nick, by the way." He offers a hand to which she grabs and shakes politely. He shifts his balance from one foot to the other. A small, awkward movement, though probably only because Sarah remains sitting and he has no way to join her to make things more casual. He clears his throat. "So, here with anyone?"

Sarah returns her gaze and nods slowly. "My brother, actually. He's around here somewhere. He says I should try to fit in, be more sociable, since we're new and all. But, considering we're about to graduate in a few days anyway." She looks away again, staring at the burning wood next to her. "Just another town I need to adapt to until I get out."

Nicholas nods. As he's lost in thought, she suddenly speaks up again.

"What about you?"

"I'm here with some friends. They're somewhere around here. I doubt you know either of them." Nicholas makes a fair assumption, judging by how new she is.

"Oh," Sarah looks up to meet his eyes, about to open up and say something, but she suddenly clams up, turning her attention downward, quiet. Confused by her reaction, Nicholas frowns, and suddenly a voice behind him cuts him off before he can say anything.

"Hey, loser!"

He turns to bring his attention to the source. Behind him stands a tall, beautiful blonde girl; the sort of perfect, teenage model type that would be just as popular in college as in high school. Ava is casually dressed for the heat of the night in a green top and tight green shorts, the sort of garb a girl might wear for running. Here, however, they complement her flawless figure. The bright colors accentuate her golden hair, but more specifically, the streaks of red dyed into the strands of long hair, just short of shoulder length. The white sandals on her feet were definitely meant for the beach but put to use in the woods regardless.

"Ava." The words slip out of Nicholas's mouth.

He tries to extend a hand out to her to shake, which only serves to create an awkward moment since Ava doesn't reciprocate. He retracts his hand with a playful chuckle, realizing that he'd picked the wrong greeting.

Ava merely laughs, giving him a playful look despite the momentary awkwardness. "It's funny, I've been to this sort of party before but I have never seen you around. Why is that?"

"Oh, this is my first time. I'm not too big on parties," Nicholas replies.

Ava keeps her smile up. "So, then what brought you to this one?"

"My friend, Sophia, she's really into this kind of stuff. I'm just here to make sure I can take her home," Nicholas admits, folding his arms across his chest. "You know, just looking out for her."

"Oh." Ava seems to mull that over a moment, biting her lower lip briefly. "...well, honestly, I don't know what she's doing here, or you for that matter. We only meant to invite Darius. I gave your friend the invitation so she could give it to him. Clearly, something got lost in translation."

Nicholas frowns, realizing. "We weren't invited?"

"Why would we invite you two losers?" She scoffs. "No, only Darius was invited."

The sort of look she has on her face is clearly condescending, as if by being close to him, he had somehow desecrated her.

Nicholas stares at the ground with a reddened face, feeling a rollercoaster of emotions. At first, he simply stands quiet, attempting to control his flaring temper. It's all he can do to avoid shouting nasty things at her; had she been Michelle, he'd have likely exploded with an avalanche of cuss words. But Ava had power here, she was surrounded by friends that would be at her side to support her at an instant if things got tense.

Unable to keep his gaze on her any longer, Nicholas walks away back the way he came. Ava can only smirk, leaning her head back a bit to look down her nose at the boy in front of her before turning around, waving a hand dismissively back at him. "Don't get lost on your way out."

Nicholas quietly walks down the road toward the parked vehicles, stopping only when he reaches Darius's car. He opens the door to the backseat, climbing in to lay down awkwardly. With not enough leg room in the back, he simply leaves the door open with his legs hanging out. He sighs and tries to get as comfortable as he can inside the back seat. Not wanting to bother Darius, and merely hoping that Sophia was having a good time, he decides to fall asleep until it is time to drive them home.

#

The feeling of the ground trembling was the only thing to break Nicholas out of his slumber. At first, he thinks that the others are simply harassing him, shaking the car as a joke, but he quickly realizes that no one is around and the sun is up. He has slept through the night.

Ignoring the sweat covering him, Nicholas slowly climbs out of the car, trying to understand what is causing the shaking, barely able to keep his footing against the trembling of the ground. The gravel beneath his feet seems almost to flow up and down like gentle waves on water, forcing him to lean against the car for support.

The nearby tents packed with sleeping teenagers erupt with confusion; the drunks that had slept on the ground are quickly roused from their sleep. Instinctively, everyone attempts to stand and move. Like dominoes, they fall over without any kind of support. The sound of rocks crumbling off the nearby mountain, now very much visible in the daylight, prompt the teenagers in the area to crawl away in fear of a landslide. Off in the distance trees fall audibly, their loud snaps and thuds filling the air as either their roots give way, or their trunks snap under the sudden shifts in balance.

"What the hell is going on?" Nicholas says, looking around in confusion.

The tremors seem to grow worse, more intense until, without warning, they abruptly stop. Nicholas takes a moment to find his balance again, before quickly moving into the campsite to search for his friends. He stumbles across Sophia first, laying on the ground on her belly, clinging desperately to the dirt. The short girl's panic is written all over her face, unmistakable.

She looks up at him and shakes her head. "What just happened?"

Nicholas wraps his arms around her and helps get her up on her feet. She clings to her friend, who quickly makes sure that she's not injured in any way. "Come on."

Sophia takes a moment to find her voice, meekly looking off in the direction of the mountainside. "Wait. Darius, he..."

"What?" Nicholas responds, alarmed.

"Darius went off toward the mountain this morning and he hasn't come back."

"Why would he do that?"

"I don't know. I told him not to go far, but he wouldn't listen. He went to talk to someone in private or something. I'm worried, Nick."

He sighs, moving to a tree and helping Sophia walk there as well. "Go to the car and stay there until I get back. I'll go find him."

"No. I'm going with you," Sophia narrows her eyes, looking back at Nicholas with a kind of look that says she's serious. "I'm not leaving you."

Against his better judgment, he sighs and relents. This isn't the time to argue. If his friend is trapped and needs help, he doesn't want to abandon him. "Okay. You know what direction he went?" He motions toward the mountain.

Without hesitation, Sophia quickly charges off in that direction, turning around a few times to make sure he is following behind. Nicholas has no trouble keeping up with her once the trees thin and the base of the mountain becomes visible.

Closer to the base of the mountain sits what was originally a campsite, now barren due to the park's sudden closure. Only a single tent sits near the edge of the trees, a faded forest green in color. The two move in closer, but Sophia stops short, looking at Nicholas expectantly. He frowns, moving in closer, kneeling to grab the zipper and slowly opening it enough to try to peek inside. He recoils almost immediately, though not from the sight, but from the smell of the unwashed hobo inside, mixed with the wreak of cheap booze.

"Hey, get the hell out of here!" The old man yells from inside, forcing the two to stumble backward and rush off toward the mountain again.

"Why don't we check the trails, then? If he went up the mountain, he'll probably be coming back down. Maybe we'll meet him half-way," Sophia suggests, adjusting her path to bring them to a dirt road leading up the side of the mountain.

The only thing marking the start of the trail is a faded wooden sign with several barely legible warnings, such as to watch for falling rocks and mountain lions. A few people have left their mark on the sign, such as heart symbols carved into them with initials of those who have probably long since separated. Next to the sign is a very large wooden board nailed to a tree. It has all the essentials of a national park informational display: the tools you should bring with you for hiking up the mountain, the dangers of surrounding wild-life and, finally, a map with the topography of the general area. While most of the information is etched into the wood, the map itself is encased in a red plastic casing. Easy to see, impossible to remove without the right tools, no doubt because of past vandalism.

Luckily, the trail isn't steep, allowing the two to make it up to the path in valuable time, though they don't see a single person on the trail. The mountain has already seen numerous landslides from the tremors throughout the last few days, but they aren't so bad that it makes climbing over the results dangerous. "I think if Darius went this way, we'd have seen him coming back by now," Nicholas says, lifting his shirt's sleeve to wipe the sweat off his brow.

"I think we should try calling him again," Sophia suggests.

Nicholas pulls his phone from his pocket. Using his fingers against the touchscreen, he pulls up Darius's name from his contacts list and the phone auto-dials for him. There's a single ring, before it goes straight to voicemail.

"Hey, this is Darius. Leave me a mes–" Nicholas ends the call early.

Sophia bites her lip. "He always answers me when I call, no matter what he's doing, that's why I'm so worried." She sighs, perking up suddenly as her attention moves away from Nick.

"This is dangerous, Sophia," says Nicholas, starting to realize how high they are up the mountain. "Why don't we go back? I'm sure we can get someone to help us look for him. You know what? I bet he's already back at camp and--"

"Wait. I think I see something," Sophia says, dashing on ahead. He quickly follows, ultimately bringing the two face to face with the entrance to a gaping chasm on the side of the mountain; the mouth of a cave. They stare at the arched entrance, spotting a backpack nearby. Sophia points to it to bring their attention forward.

Approaching the backpack, Sophia crouches to unzip it, digging around for a moment until she finds a music player and a notebook with Darius's name written on it. "This is his backpack, Nick. Darius was here. Why would he leave it here just like that?" Sophia frowns, standing back up and patting herself down a moment. "He might be hurt. Or worse."

"Let's not jump to any conclusions," Nicholas says, shaking his head. He turns to look at the trail, making sure that there was no other way their friend could've gone. The mountain expands further to the side, but it's too steep for anyone to have gone that route. The cave is the only thing directly on the trail. "I don't think this is a good idea, Sophia. The mountain is unstable right now. What if the tremors come back?"

"DARIUS!" Sophia calls out into the pitch blackness, her voice echoing multiple times on the inside. She sweeps away dust from her jacket a moment before reaching into her pocket. "I've got a flashlight." She produces it. It's small, something she would use. Had this not been such a tense situation, Nicholas might've joked about it being the perfect size for her. As calmly as she can manage with shaking hands, she offers it to him so he can take the lead. "We'll go in a little bit, see if we find or hear anything."

He takes the flashlight and looks at the darkness swallowing the light just a few inches beyond the mouth of the cave. He steps forward, with Sophia behind him. "Alright, fine. We'll take a look. Just a look, Sophia, and then come back out if we can't find anything."

"Nick?" A voice hails them from behind.

Nicholas turns his attention back toward the voice, only to find Sarah. With her hoodie down, her brown hair is more obvious than the previous night when they'd first met. "Sarah?"

Sarah crosses her arms as she approaches them. "My brother's gone, I can't find him anywhere and he's not picking up his phone. I thought he might've come up here." She seems visibly worried. "Have either of you seen him?"

Both Nicholas and Sophia shake their heads. "Sorry, I don't know what he looks like," Sophia admits and Nick nods in agreement with that statement. If they'd been introduced the previous night perhaps, but...

"I've asked around, no one seems to know where he went. I thought maybe—" She sighs, trying to muster the correct words. "I don't know. I just saw you two coming up here, so I thought I'd ask. I'm sorry to bother you."

There is a moment of silence before Sarah turns around.

"Hey, wait." Nicholas frowns and steps away from the cave entrance. "Maybe we can help you look for him, once we're done here."

"Are you guys looking for someone?" Sarah says, noticing the flashlight in Nicholas's hand and the duo's proximity to the cave.

Nicholas and Sophia both nod. "Yeah. Our friend Darius."

"Oh." Sarah gently bites her lower lip, before quickly continuing. "Well, I'm going to go back down. I'll give you my number so we can stay connected, in case you guys hear anything about my brother."

Sarah walks up to the chasm to interchange phone numbers with them. "Here's mine."

She looks at the mouth of the cave as they're meddling with their phones. "Are you guys sure about going in there? It looks really unsafe and there are aftershocks. Maybe this isn't such a good idea."

"Yeah, that's what I said," Nicholas says, eyeing Sophia, hoping that it'll convince her to back out. But Sophia remains unphased, staring back with a stony face. "Look," she says, "if we can't find him, then we'll just go back and go to the police or something. But I'm not walking away until I'm sure he's not in there hurt or worse."

"Fine," Nicholas replies reluctantly. "But it'll just be a quick peek. Otherwise, we risk getting trapped ourselves in there. And then that won't help Darius or anybody." He returns his gaze to Sarah. "We'll see you later. I hope you find your brother."

"Likewise, I hope you find your friend," she replies, before turning around and heading down the trail. "Good luck!"

Nicholas motions for Sophia to follow him, and the two walk into the chasm at the side of the mountain, flashlight in hand. "Okay. Ready?"

Sophia nods, and the two step into the darkness. Beyond the entrance, the temperature cools considerably. The humidity of the cave is due largely to the light puddles created by water dripping through some cracks overhead. Because the ceiling lacks stalactites, these are notably new creations, likely because of the tremors. The cave is uniform from entrance to exit, a nearly perfect arch that doesn't seem quite natural. Just as the light begins to fade from what sunlight pours in through the entrance, Nicholas flicks the flashlight on, the tool creating a thin beam of light that helps the two navigate.

It takes a moment, but the two eventually come to a stop. "I don't think anyone is in here, Sophia." They pause when both spot movement near the entrance. What were once specks of sunlight at the beginning of the cave are now blocked by the silhouettes of approaching forms. The two turn to head back in the direction of the entrance, making it less of a run for who appears to be Darius, and Sarah, coming their way. Even they are panting and trying to catch their breath by the time they reach Nicholas and Sophia.

"Funny story?" says Sarah, as she finally gets close enough. "As I was heading back, I saw your friend here coming up the trail." She catches her breath, a proud smile growing on her face. "I asked for his name. It seemed to match. So, I had him follow me back here."

Darius steps out from behind Sarah, his face and clothing as dirty as everyone else's. He has a scratch mark on his right cheek, probably from a slight fall.

Sophia lets out a cry of joy and runs forward, wrapping her arms around him. "Darius! You're alright! Where were you?"

"I was at camp with Ava," Darius says, patting Sophia on the back. "We were up here half an hour ago but then the tremors started, so we ran back to camp. The others mentioned you guys left in this direction, so I came looking for you two. I was worried," he says, taking a moment to catch his breath. "Are you guys okay?"

Moving into the dim light behind him cast by the flashlight is Ava, who's clearly annoyed.

"Alright, you found them, Darius. Now can we please get out of here? This place is creepy and it's not safe at all." She whines, eyes darting about like she's expecting the mountain to swallow them up at any moment. She grabs hold of his arm, tugging at him. "Come on."

"She's right," says Darius. "We should leave. It's not stable."

As the group begins their trek back, the ground begins to shake again, gradually at first and then unbearably strong. Darius and Nicholas try and keep their cool, but Sophia visibly panics, clutching to the nearest person desperately. The teenagers begin to lose their balance as the foundation beneath their feet betrays them, swaying from side to side. The cave in the direction of the entrance begins to buckle and collapse. "Alright, go!" Darius yells over the deafening grind of stone all around them. A suffocating plume of dust begins to engulf the area.

The group make their way through the narrow cavern, with Nicholas quickly helping Ava up. Darius lifts Sophia into his arms and turns where Nicholas's flashlight has lit the way. Nicholas spares Ava only a momentary glance as they walk together towards the exit. "Of all the people I get to die in the bowels of the Earth with..." he mutters under his breath.

As the walls begin to crack under pressure, their walk quickly turns into a full sprint. Ava whines her fear and exhaustion, her sandals clearly not meant to run on the slick wet stone of the cave. Sarah covers her head with her hoodie to avoid getting hit by falling debris but it's no use.

The cracks on the ceiling above the entrance, on the verge of giving out, finally do and an avalanche of dirt and rock comes flooding in. Nicholas reaches out to grab his friends, but their momentum proves too much for his strength. All five of them tumble into the incoming wave.

The entrance completely collapses, sealing the cave with large chunks of the mountain as plumes of dust cover the area, succumbing the inside to pure darkness once more.