After Jack and Mel vaulted over the wall, they went the same direction Mel last saw Hope go; towards the woods that circled the lake. The monster chasing them was nowhere to be seen nor heard in any direction. Mel counted that as good because it meant the one chasing them was slightly off their trail. The only concern she had right now was where her princess was.

Jack eventually forced her to sit and rest to actually give the wound time to heal. She also started mixing natural herbs to speed up the process.

"I get that an invisibility spell would confuse the... whatever, but how do we destroy it?"

"That's what the others at the school are trying to find out. They're after me and Hope, and I'm guessing the reason she's out here is to keep it as far away from them as possible."

"Why you two?"

Melori pursed her lips to keep quiet. She knew it had to be Malivore, and it likely is if those things out there. However, no one but the Dream Team knew about her history. Mel figured it best not saying she's also part witch and that Malivore wanted them both dead.

Jack nodded. She knew she wasn't going to say. "Lay on your belly."

"For what?"

She tilted her head to the side, then lifted the bark in her hand that had some weird mushy tree stuff on it as Mel called it. "So I can apply this."

"Jack, if you wanted to touch my butt you could've just asked."

"Ha-ha, really funny, Mel. Just lay down." Mel rolled over onto one of the logs to lay on her belly. Jack sat down with the mush in hand. "So if we find Hope-"

"When."

"Sorry, when... we find Hope. We're really just gonna stall things I can't even see until your friends come up with a solution? I mean, even then, how do we contact them?"

"I'm going on hope that Hope has a phone on her. If not, I'm sure two witches can figure it ow...t... fucking hell, Jack!"

Jack had spread some of the mixture onto Mel's wound as gently as possible. But with the wound having penetrated the muscle, it caused some near-unbearable pain. It was also because...

"I used some wolfsbane in the mixture-"

"You what?! Are you trying to poison me?"

"I used it so your skin could burn and close the wound. Like cauterization," Jack continued. "And now your body will work twice as hard to heal because it knows it needs to remove the wolfsbane from your system."

"That actually makes some sense. But did it have to hurt that bad?"

"Just be grateful I'm here to literally save your ass, Mel," Jack laughed. She unpackaged a bandage she managed to snag while she and Mel were running.

Melori sucked up the pain to get up on her own two feet. She stretched her arms over her head. "I know you're gonna grill me about standing, walking, whatever, but I really need to make sure the princess is okay. So let's go." Without another word, Mel walked past Jack to keep searching for Hope in the wilderness.

Jack followed, but she couldn't help but wonder what Mel meant by "princess".

Not what she expected when she wanted to befriend the hybrid girl, huh?

The girls continued through the woods, looking in every direction for any sign of life (or even death). They saw no one or nothing, however, what Mel did find was a trail. She tapped Jack's arm and pointed down.

"What?" Jack asked.

"A trail. Broken twigs, crushed leaves... plus this footprint."

"Someone was dragging their feet. Think it's Hope?"

Mel shook her head. She stood upright to place her foot next to the print. "Hope and I are about the same height. Our foot sizes would be similar, but that one's way too big. So it's gotta be the monster's."

"Except for that one," Jack said, pointing out another footprint. "Now that one has to be it."

Jack went on following the trail Hope left. It was clear she was running instead of walking given how spaced out the steps actually were. And the fact that the other set of footprints sometimes overlapped meant that the monster was probably on her trail too. Eventually, however, the monster's footprints went in a completely different direction than where Hope was going. It lost her, somehow. Maybe it wasn't smart enough to follow a trail like this.

The two kept going until the prints suddenly came to a stop. The larger trees in the area made it hard to see where she could be. Then again, sine the trees are large, chances are that she's behind one of them.

Melori called out to her in a whisper. "Hope?"

"Is that really you?"

"Of course it is, who else would I be?"

Hope popped her head around the tree. "The reaper, duh?"

"Well I'm not, and you know that, otherwise I'd be blasted into oblivion. What did you say it was?"

She rounded the tree, placing her hands on her hips. "Josie called me. They said it's a kind of ghoul. Specifically a reaper; someone, likely Malivore, hires it or whatever to kill someone of their choosing. But they can go after only one person per job, so that's why there's two. Only it's victims can see it."

"Got that part. But how do we kill it?"

"Unless either one of us can get close enough to behead it, you can't, so we're quite possibly screwed. Hey, Jack."

"Hi."

"Can we at least go back to the school? There are weapons there."

"Not without risking anyone else getting hurt. Like it or not, we're on our own."

"That's awesome," Mel said with a lot of sarcasm. Cause it really wasn't considering neither of them truly knows what they're doing. "That is just... awesome."

"How about we... run for our lives?" Hope said, straining a smile. "Like, now."

Mel turned to look behind her, now seeing exactly why Hope looked like she was constipated. Both the reapers were slowly creeping up to them. Knowing they were the target, Jack grabbed the other two and tugged them along with her.

"If you two get me killed, I will haunt your asses to the edge the universe and back."

One of the reapers sped its way before them, blocking their path forward while the other blocked the path behind them. It was clear that either way they went, the reapers would block them. Mel instinctively grabbed Hope and pulled her close. She made sure not to let go for even a second, even when Hope tried to pull away.

But surely enough, the reapers both inched closer and closer until they eventually went into a full sprint towards the girls. They pounced at once, flying through the air to get them, and in the same time, an invisible force had sent them back into a pile of fallen twigs and leaves. One girl was just as confused as the other until they turned on their backs.

Davina was there, somehow, and she had just saved their lives.

The reapers stopped themselves from colliding and landed well on their old, crippling feet. And even though Davina was there, they only cared for their targets. However, before they could take another step, Davina raised her hands towards them, stopping them in their tracks with that mysterious invisible force. She then forced them to face one another, placing a hand at the top of the other's head with a tight grip.

Before either of the teenagers realized what was going to happen, reapers one and two ripped each other's heads off in one singular move.

When the bodies dropped, Mel, Hope, and Jack had a clear view of Davina standing with her hands in her pockets. Nonchalant, at that, as if she didn't just single handedly take out two bloodthirsty monsters wanting to kill her niece and company.

"I could've had that," Hope sighed.

"They would have killed you. But I'm here, so..."

"Mrs. Claire, how did you know we were out here?" Jack asked, getting up to dust herself off.

Davina shrugged, shaking her head. "I'll explain on the way back. Let's go, ladies."

"It's a shame I couldn't try that invisibility spell," she mumbled to herself.

Jack followed close behind Davina as she walked off while Melori got up first and helped Hope to her feet. They walked a steady pace, side by side for a couple seconds before Hope stopped in her tracks.

"Are you gonna let go of my hand now?"

Mel gave a small smile while shaking her head then looked into the tribrid's eyes. "Not until you're safe."

sickness update:

got tested, and like I suspected, it's not covid. I'm just sick for some reason with a 99.9° fever :)

anyway, I'm low-key tempted to just upload all these chapters but I'm gonna be smart and stick to the "pre-writing" plan.

as always, thank you for reading. if anyone's got some plot ideas, I'm more than open to hearing about them!

also fun fact, I haven't even watched season 3 of Legacies and I've seen some spoilers about it but I'll find some way to incorporate it here. just to keep with the program..

okay I better stop here before I keep rambling.

kisses x