Crossing the Vale

The Fairwood Meadow lies upon the Gold and Silver Mountains, which they have been renamed a fair amount with people moving in and out of the areas all the time. It has been said that once fae like creatures lived in this area. Nyads and Dryads, Fairies, and Satyrs all lived in this area. As the oceans and lakes changed Merfolk have moved through the area, Giants, Elves, Dwarves, and Trolls all lived upon the earth. However one day that all stopped. The worlds became separated though no one knew how nor why. Every once in a great while though doorways between the realms opened and people were able to cross the veil. One of the most common of these doorways was a small Vale. Suncopper Vale, which was relater named the Fairwood Meadow.

Suncopper Vale was known for its staying so close to how nature truly was meant to be. It had not changed much with human interaction and invasive species moving in. It seemed as if the Suncopper Vale would always stay the same. Many animals still lived in that area and were still in tune with the nature around them. It was that and many other reasons why people would go to the areas surrounding it to camp and hike along that area, and for scientists to come and study it.

No human would notice the odd disappearance of others though, they would think some sad, odd fellow would get lost in the woods and would send a search party for them, some they would find speaking of crazy, imaginative beings that were just fairytales, others they would not find at all. Children who would go missing were more likely to be found, or they would run back to their parents telling stories which their parents would just pass as their imagination running wild in the woods. Almost all children would come back after crossing that veil, adults were not as lucky.

If only they would remember the stories they were told when they were younger, the warnings that were told in those old “fairytales” they may have had a chance to come back. However not all fairytales are true, so which ones to believe in, well that’s another story.

Dr. Andrea Kirkland, still revealing in the fact that she has a Doctor by her name and a PhD at the end of it, was getting ready for her first major field study since getting her doctorate. She sent out a mass email to all the grad students, undergrads, and high school science interns she would be taking on her trip (the high school science interns was the University’s idea: it would get more people interested in the ecological fields being their reasoning). She sent a warning that her Great Dane, Ace, would be going with them and that those who were afraid of big dogs should not be bothered by Ace as he was well trained or should not come if it would bother them to the point where they would not be able to stand it. Andrea’s reasoning on that also being if they can’t take a well trained, domesticated dog how could they take the wild animals, this was also mostly a warning to the interns and the undergraduates who have not taken field trips or classes with her yet.

She finished packing up her stuff that would be used for trapping and documenting the animals at Sagehorn, and more specifically what used to be called Fairwood Meadows. She made sure to pack her trapping license and permission forms and emailed her graduate students to do the same. She made a quick list in her head on what she and the other students should bring then pressed send. Andrea smiled, this trip would be extremely interesting.

To Those Who Are Going on the Sagehorn Trip:

This is Dr. Andrea Kirkland saying thank you all for coming and I hope you truly enjoy this experience in trapping and documenting trip. I hope you get to fully experience the wonder of nature and the beauty of its natural environment. Maybe you’ll even learn a bit more about the animals we’ll be seeing on this trip. To my undergraduate students you are required to bring your field notebook because you’re required to write on three mammals that we DO NOT catch during this trip and make sure you write a list of those we DO catch today though you are not required to do a field notebook entry on them.
Things you should bring:
Sleeping bag
Pillow
Blankets (if you do not have a sleeping bag or if you want to bring them extra)
Jacket (it will be cold at night)
Shoes
Clothes
Any toiletries you need to bring (I’m not your mother I’m not going to tell you what you should fully bring)
Field notebooks and pens (Jake reminds me to tell you not to write with pencils)
Field guides (it was a required purchase for Undergrad and Grad students)
Headlamp/Flashlight
Binoculars (optional)
Utility tools (if you have one)
Sunscreen
Waterbottle
Snacks
We have already separated into groups for dinner/breakfast cooking/cleaning groups. Also packing group be there an hour before we leave to help pack up the vans with the traps.
See you all soon,
Andrea Kirkland.

It was 5 o' clock in the morning when the sounds of the alternative rock radio station started to play from the little alarm clock sitting on the desk.

Beatrice (better known as Betty) Delrano was up in a heartbeat, then yawned and slowly waltzed over to her computer.

She went straight to her e-mail's and noticed she got a new one; after reading it the grogginess faded away and she screamed to the heavens, "YEEEEESSSS!!"

Quickly earning her a "SHUT UP!" from her top floor neighbor.

Giggling softly she quickly gathered the materials she would need for the trip; all your standard camping supplies and the field notebook in stuff. No biggy. Then she went through everything else she wanted for the trip. Mainly her first aid kit; honestly it was a bit unfair to the kit to merely call it a 'first aid' kit, more like a 'if the doctor forgot his bag at home, where covered!' kind of kit.

Sure maybe she was over packing a bit, but hay it's her stuff and she's carrying it so nah!

After a quick double check of her supplies she finally got dressed in her standard clothes and overalls, doing up her bandana in the standard trifold, grabbed her two bags and headed out the door with an extremely brief, "HAYMAIgottheinternshipnowbye!"

"Bye Betty! Be Back Before Barbra's Birthday!" was all her mother shouted back.

It was early in the afternoon when Elandiil set out for the forest. He was taking his last test as an adept, he was to go and survive in the forest, using nothing but magic to sustain himself and his own skills, for an entire week. It was a test every adept had to take before becoming an expert and leaving the academy, and not all of them came back. Still, he was excited, he knew his parents would be very proud of him when he graduated. And he knew the forests very well, the ancient trees, and the animals residing in them.

He said his farewells to his friends and his teachers, and walked out smiling as the warmth of the day hit him, he walked along to the forest, opening his senses to nature and feeling the plants and animals around, it was a peaceful day, the wind was slightly blowing, it was the growing season, the familiar smells of the alchemical gardens was the last thing of the academy he saw before reaching the edge of the forest. He walked in and immediately felt the trees close him off from outside, the ancient trees had thoughts of their own, and they seemed to enjoy messing with travelers. Or maybe they knew the purpose of the test. They've been around longer than the academy after all.

He shrugged and walked for a few hours, before deciding to sit down and mark the time. He had six days, and 20 hours left of his test. From listening to his teacher, he knew it wouldn't be truly hard until the fifth day, as he let his magic sense roam the area, he felt something strange pulling to the East, and decided he would check that out later. A stipulation of the test was that students would not close themselves off to the world, this forced them to not kill animals or harm many plants, as they themselves would feel it. He sat against the trunk of a tree, meditating, confident in his abilities.

Andrea checked over all the trapping equipment and the video cameras. She looked over the peanut butter, honey, nuts, sardines, and other meats and cheeses for traps. She counted all the Shewman traps and the Tomahawk traps; luckily they were collapsible traps so they’ll be able to take a lot more than if they weren’t. The five graduate students appeared a little before the undergrads and the interns who were to pack showed and all of them checked over the markers. They went over each of the tags, the ethanol, scissors, marker, plastic bags, pillow cases, and other trapping items.

“Ready Dr. Kirkland?” Jake, her classes teaching assistant smirked. She smirked back, “Andrea, you know better Jake. And of course I am, it’s finally time to find out some of the mysteries of Sagehorn.” Her grad students all chuckled knowing some of the rumors surrounding the area.

Andrea stood by the vans opening the backs up each of her T.A. grad students standing near. She smiled seeing a dragonfly from an ecology lab class hanging on one of the bars. She sat in the back of one of the vans, the one she would be driving; waiting for the students to arrive. They would be leaving at 1 p.m. so the packers should be arriving noon, all were to eat before they left.

The first students arrived.
“For those of you who don’t know me,” she announced seeing some interns with them as the start of the packing group, “I am Andrea Kirkland. Call me Andrea, Dr. Kirkland, Andy, anything but Kirkland only a select few can call me that. You lucky few are part of our groups packing group, your in charge of packing these vans with our equipment, which is in the lab, and unpacking them when our trip is over. As you know the trip is lasting about a week long so I hope you’ve packed enough stuff. Also you lucky few get to choose what van you want to be with. Let me introduce you to the Grad students who will be with us. This is Jake,” I pointed to the blond man who was pretty tall and had short hair, a mustache, and a beard, “this is Narrissa,” a brown haired woman which was up in a ponytail, “this is Daniel,” a short brown haired man with glasses, “this is Melinda” a woman with short dark brown hair, “and last but not least this is Xane,” a long dark brown haired man. “They’ll be helping me during this trip treat them as you would treat me. Follow me to the lab! Any questions?”

It had not taken Betty too terribly long to get over to the site where they were meeting up at, just a few trains, a bus, and a tiny 4 mile walk. It was now a little before noon.

She had arrived just as the introductions and instructions were being announced. A few other interns and students were quietly whispering away, mostly about the rumors.

"You think they'll be a portal or two? Maybe a creepy zombie or mage or something?"

"Like, eww! of course not! There's gonna like be hot guys and like pretty unicorns and rainbows!"

Not one to actually join conversations (but listen in endlessly) Betty thought of her own responses, "Shouldn't you guys be thinking of all the animals and work 'n stuff? What are you doing thinking of all of that nonsense before a science trip?"

She then paused and tilted her head, "Then again if I don't see at least one dragon or killer man eating bug, I will be thoroughly disappointed."

That aside it was time to pack the vans. Picking one at random she tossed her stuff in and started to rearrange everything in there to fit everything in all nice and neat.

She didn't have very many questions (well not any interesting or constructive ones at least) so she didn't ask any when the doctor asked for any.

Until she quicky rushed back to the doctor remembering one, "Excuse me Doctor! Quick question! I brought 16 vials of common medicines including stuff like aspirin, Tylenol, ibuprofens, and an extra EpiPen, do you think I should have brought more?"

When he opened his eyes again it was hard to tell how much time had passed, but it was darker. He knew it was night-time without even being able to see the sky. It was at this time he decided to check out the strange feeling he felt earlier, he moved towards it. Heading east through the trees, he noticed the closer he got to the area the stronger magic felt, and the less animals went around it. After walking for about thirty minutes he came across a clearing. He was immediately hit with unease as he looked at it.

"This... Is unnatural.." He said more to himself than anything else, the trees nearby ignored his probing, and the grass seemed lifeless even as it was green. He backed away, and made a note of the location, in total about seven hours travel East of the academy. He would tell his teachers when he returned, and see what they knew.

He walked back about a mile, still feeling the anomaly of the clearing. But at least here there were animals, and the plants were as they should be. His throat was dry and he decided to find a river, magic could do many things, but it was not a substitute for water, and he didn't want to expel the energy in a water spell. Not yet.

He knelt and placed his hand flat on the ground, extending his senses through the grass until he felt a deer. He carefully probed it's mind and found a nearby river. He walked to it, and took a drink. "This should be as good a camp as any." He sat back down, and opened his senses as far as he could, feeling every plant and animal within a mile of him. As he felt no hostility towards him from them, and relaxed and slipped into his meditation again.

“Direct one isn’t she,” one of her grad students laughed, Andrea forced down a smile.

“No that’s more than enough considering we have all that and more,” Andrea smiled. She had the group pack the trucks with the trapping equipment and then with their camping gear. Andrea loaded all the students up and then set an order for the drivers, she’d be leading in the first van and each of the T.A.s would be driving in others except for Melinda and Xane who’d be going together.

The drive was about 2 hours long to get to Sagehorn. She asked a student to get out of the car and unlock the gate with a simple passcode, the lock would have four digit code to turn forward. The student would have to keep the gate open and hop into the van in the back.

As Andrea drove past a small meadow she turned towards it hearing a small chime, no one seemed to hear it in her car. She looked at the meadow and remembered her childhood there, now she’d be able to study the mammals there, even the few she hadn’t been able to recognize from her studies.

She jumped out of the van at the main campground and talked to the campground ranger/manager. One was new moving around from campground to campground the other was the main one in charge, her correspondent, the one who fully knew everything about Sagehorn’s interesting mammals. Sadly he told her that they couldn’t trap and tag bats for worry of the white fungus.

“Alright everyone!” Andrea yelled out, “This is your home for the next week! It won’t be like real camping as you will be staying in cabins, you have electricity, and running plumbing.” She smirked, “Heat however is another story. Showers are communal; boys stay on the boys side, girls on the girls. I and the T.A.s will have our own cabins that are near by to your own areas. There is a big mess hall which will be by the boys side and the amphitheater on the girls side. We will meet at the amphitheater after everyone is done unpacking in…30 minutes. See you then.” Andrea smiled watching everyone scramble before turning on the heel of her foot and heading toward her cabin.

"And...MORE?" Betty thought, as she rubbed her chin in a decidedly evil manor, "Hmm...Sis isn't here right now. Maybe some minor looting is in order!"

But Betty couldn't dwell on this as they soon had a car ride to there new base. The fields and forests swooped on by, occasionally catching her interest though it was more often glued on Daniel's less then totally awesome driving.

As they arrived in camp, she was only half listening to what was being said.

Something about no bats, no individual showers, anthem theater 30 minutes, were all she got aside from one very interesting thing...

"It won’t be like real camping as you will be staying in cabins, you have electricity, and running plumbing.”

"She sounds really disappointed about that. I need to stay in her good books if I'm ever going to be trusted to do any thing. Hmm...No power or water? Pfft! That can easily be arranged, now I just need to find a power box..."

As her thoughts started to de-rail she turned and was immediately captivated by the trees.

More specifically between the trees, well hidden by there branches, a very small...'path' was there.

It wasn't really a path; there was a lot of undergrowth but some thing about a straight shot between trees with no bushes that make her think path.

When were not busy I'm going to check it out. she stood there and proceeded to contemplate the path for almost 20 minutes, of which gave some of the lighter packed students to finish and stare at her funny when they realized she hadn't budged an inch sense they got here.

At exactly ten minutes till they had to meet at the theater, she suddenly skipped away to try and find an unoccupied spot in some random cabin somewhere.

"I wonder who will bunk with me?"

His meditation drew to a close as the light of dawn broke through the sky, the area around him was quiet, the only sound the running of the river. Most of the animals around him were waking up and beginning their routines. Birds were beginning to chirp, and the smell of morning dew was strong on the air.

He decided he would practice magic he couldn't really do at the academy, skin-changing. It wasn't banned at the academy, there just wasn't many things to do it with. He reached out with his mind, and found a suitable animal. A wolf, stalking a deer through the trees. He entered it's mind, he felt the strong resistance and revulsion to an uninvited visitor, but that faded as their minds melded.

Suddenly he was the wolf, and he was hungry, the scent of the deer was strong, and he was determined to feed. Almost involuntarily he bounded forward, the deer caught wind of him and tried to run, but he caught it quickly, and fed. Feeling the taste of his fresh kill, the warm blood...

He sprung back to his mind, feeling uneasy. It was always a strange feeling, feeding through an animal, it almost made him feel full. One had to be careful, it was easy to get confused what was you and what was the animal. He stood up and stretched his legs, he still had a long time left in his survival test.

Andrea set up the tape, as the campground manager told her which areas were to be off limits. As she passed by a small trail, she knelt down and picked up some grass. These aren’t from here, she thought, invasive? One more she heard a chime and she looked towards the path, it was familiar. Her watch alarm went off reminding her to go back to the amphitheater.

She set up the amphitheater with her laptop and the projector before bringing up the different mammals they would see during their trip. Some would be unlikely, mostly the carnivores, but some of the smaller rodents, there was a high chance. Slowly but surely the students and interns began to fill in.

“Hey everyone!” she began, “for those of you who are apart of my class make sure you turn in your first assignment into Jake before we head out. So this is our Mammalogy Field Trip of the year, we’ll be here for a week, make sure you treat this place with respect and make sure you clean everything before we leave better than when we find it so we can be invited back. Also we have been told that we can’t trap any Chiropterans because of the white fungus going around, also we have taped off an area, do not go past that tape, we were told that people have been getting hurt by some dangerous animals back there and some even went missing.” Andrea then started to go over their schedule for the day and who would be going on dinner detail that night and breakfast detail in the morning.

“We’re going to split into groups and go into different areas. There will be six groups so make sure to split yourselves up pretty evenly.” She paused, “Go!”

After hearing another little speech in the amphitheater, Betty soon turned her attention to the students; betty does not pick. Betty lets fate decide who will be with her.

And sense Jake was sticking around do to the homework pickup, it seemed he would be her partner.

She had not previously spoken to the bearded mystery; from what she could see he seemed jolly enough. as soon as everyone else left, she finally approached him handing him her work.

As he put it away she looked up to face him eye to eye, "your tall. be my partner please!"

He laughed a bit and dropped a hand on her head, "any one would be taller that a squirt like you! alright; what direction do you wanna go?"

She glanced about a bit, she wanted to inspect the path, but she didn't want him to know about it instead she pointed at one of the taped off areas, "there! lets go there!"

"But uh..."

"Betty."

"But Betty, we can't go down there; why on earth would you want to?"

She in a huff she turned away, "Silly! We need to go down there; if we find slash maybe catch one of the animals hurting folk she'll really appreciate it! We could be trusted more 'n stuff! Besides, we could always say we took another route and wound up passing into an area guarded by tape by accident."

"I don't know...what if-"

"bah! if you get hurt I got the medicine and band aids to fix ya, now come on lets get moving already!"

Reluctantly he relented and they soon wandered into the great big woods.

He followed the river for a little bit, wondering what to do with his time. He took to playing around with the water for a little bit, a low energy spell that used like this took much skill. He bent the water in multiple ways, making images. He created people, animals, and even made them move. Just like one of his teachers always did. His wasn't as fluid, but it was there.

The water fell with a more than audible splash when he suddenly released the spell. He took a deep breath as he felt a strong pulling from the grove, he couldn't ignore it, it was a stronger feeling than even the things right next to him. Against his better judgement he returned to it. The sense of trepidation quieted by curiosity and the pulling sensation the grove was causing.

When he returned to it it was hardly changed, yet it felt different. The grass had a faint life to it, and the trees seemed to at least recognize they were wrong. It pondered it, just yesterday there was no life to be felt here. He resisted the urge to walk into the grove. The pulling sense had faded away anyways. And he had decided to return to his camp. He wondered if his teachers knew of this area, surely they did..

He decided on thinking for his future, when he finished the test he would be free to do whatever he wanted with his life. He had thought about becoming a writer, a painter, or some other form of artist, he doubted his father would like that. He had also thought about serving the world in their army. They were always told they needed skilled mages. And his father served when he was younger. So many choices. He had never been to the Great City. Perhaps that would be his first destination. He sighed again, still a few days to think about it.

Andrea stopped and turned her group of was about eight students watched her. Andrea quickly turned to Jake.

“Jake what are you doing? Your group has to be more than one person. As for you Miss Delrano you will stay with your group and stay away from the paths I have marked. I can send you home at any time and you will have to pay the compensation. I will not get us banned from here because one intern did not listen to the rules. You’ll be in my group.”

Jake gave a nod and called to his group, there were at least eleven students in it.
“Miss Delrano, what were you thinking I said split into groups with a T.A. or myself there is more than just you and Jake here?” She gave a shake of her head before motioning for her group to join them, “Follow me and step lively!”

She moved for them to go into the meadow where she used to play as a child, not that far was the area that was marked off.
“We’ll be setting our traps here, if any of you try to go to the place I marked I will know, and so will Ace.” The Great Dane barked in agreement, “He’ll be making sure none of you get ideas to go across that area.”

“In this area we’ll be checking for mostly Rodentia but we’ll leave a few traps for some large Carnivores and Herbivores. Our main bait will be a mixture of peanut butter, honey, and oats. We’ll also be putting in cotton balls for them as it is to get really cold tonight. For the carnivores we’ll be using video traps and be using sardines as our bait.” She quickly showed them how to set up and bait the Shewman and Tomahawk traps. She also showed them certain trails for voles and told them that if they capture shrews there would be a high chance that the shrew would not survive because of their metabolic rate being so high that if they pretty much stop eating for more than a span of two hours they’d die.

“Alright everyone take your traps and some flags and place them where you’ll remember them come tomorrow. This is the start of what we’ll be doing for the entire week, if you need help come find me I’ll be placing some as well.” She let the students on their own and to make sure no one went near the line she went to place her traps over there.

Betty blinked, and then realized her mistake, she blushed, got flustered and said quickly, "I...I'm sorry miss! I wasn't sure how big the groups were and..." she removed her glasses, a very large smudge overtaking the majority of one of the lens, "I...didn't notice 'cause...my glasses..."

Trying to hide her embarrassment she looked away and honestly was getting ready to cry, she only wanted to do good! Why would they yell at her for that...?

She glanced at the dog, and started feeling spitey. Knowing full well nothing she would do or had could hurt the dog with out giving her away ("What? me? Naw! He totally just found 25 grams of Tylenol lying around and ate it!....yeah not happening...) she just planted a fake shaky smile on her face and waltzed away, face full of tears, to set up a trap.

That feeling returned; she wanted to go to her path. Maybe not to set up traps, she sighed, setting up one of her own. Knowing her luck she'd probably catch one of the poor shrews....

...Suddenly Ace froze and seemed to nervously glance about. What's up with him? That can't be good...

Then a huge wave of unease hit her, W-What's going on?

Only a few others started to feel it, and before she knew it she had run over to Andrea, "Mis. What exactly was going around here?" she started shuffling on her feet, "I mean I know there were animal attacks and it was severe enough that they're all taped off 'n stuff but...please tell me I..." she paused and considered what would work with all her other teachers, "I...am VERY curious because it would be great foresight for when I do something very stupid!"  

She then sheepishly smiled a toothy grin.

Andrea stood on the edge of where was marked putting her traps there to make sure the others didn’t go near it, especially Miss Beatrice, or Betty as she introduced herself, Delrano. Ace stood by opposite of her walking down the row keeping an eye behind her. As she placed another trap Ace immediately straitened and barked running past the line and into the woods. Andrea kept an eye for a little bit before hearing a chime once more.

A chill ran down Andrea’s back the chime got louder but no one else seemed to hear it. She got closer to the bound off area, lifting the caution tape just a centimeter, people wouldn’t have noticed.

A yelp sounded.

“Ace!” Andrea quickly dodged under the tape and ran down the path that Ace had bounded on earlier. She dodged bushes and trees going deeper and deeper into the woods. Animals would watch some would move a few feet before to let her pass before moving on to their normal positions.

Andrea pushed through a huge batch of bushes and trees into a large clearing, she found Ace, asleep. She quickly ran towards Ace and checked to see if he was alright, if there were any injuries. Luckily there were no injuries and he was just asleep, how her dog passed out so quickly she had no clue. Andrea felt a chill go down her spine as a branch snapped.

"Oh dear, what happened here?"

Betty saw the Doc kneeling by her dog, out cold for some reason, and looking very angry.

"What? I can't just leave you in the supposedly dangerous woods! We might not have gotten off on the right foot but that doesn't mean I don't care!"

Betty also kneeled by the dog, seeing no injuries she said, "Well, he looks fine to me, maybe he hit a tree? ...no where in a clearing...hmmm..." she absent mindedly rubbed her glasses, leaving a smear.

She noticed a small nick on the Doc's arm, "Here," see reached into her pocket, "have a band aid!" and promptly offered one.

He awoke from his meditation with a start, something felt wrong, very wrong. The feeling from the strange grove was stronger than it had ever been, he stood, and started to move towards it before he stumbled, it had been several hours since he moved, and his body was weak. He drew energy from the plants and animals, he was so worried that he almost drew too much, the ground at his feet turning brittle, and brown.

When he was revitalized, he ran to the grove, determined to find the source of the disturbance, when he arrived it was visibly unchanged, but he could feel fear and distress...

Andrea gave Betty an unimpressed look, a band-aid, really? She reached in her bag and got some smelling salts. After a student fainted a few years ago after seeing a mouse the smelling salts were always packed. Ace made a face before starting to stir. The trees started to rustle and immediately Andrea yelled for Betty and pushing herself in front of the young intern.

Andrea pulled out a gun, something she only brought in case something like a bear, which never happened, or someone crazy happened upon the camp, which happened once to another camp group apparently. She aimed steadily waiting for the trees to stop rustling. This area was blocked off for a reason.

Andrea’s shoulders sagged when a small rabbit hopped out but a few moments later the bushes and trees started to rustle again.

It was clear the doctor did not appreciate anything Betty did. The dog was fine, it would have woken up soon anyways.

She made up her mind then; it wasn't worth trying to be friends with the Doc, no matter what she did trying to be friendly or helpful she didn't appreciate it.

'And to think I was going to cut the power for her! Well ha! Look whose not going to have the true blue camping experience!'

Betty put the band aid on the Doc's wound anyways. It was a good band aid that deserved a chance to live out it's purpose in life.

But enough about band aid the bushed started to rumble and the Doc leaped in ready for action with a gun!

Suddenly it seemed like a good idea to continue the efforts of being friends with the lady with the deadly weapon.

The bushes rustled once more, and a bunny hopped out.

"Aww! A bunny!"

And then they started to rustle again.

Everything felt wrong here, the trees, the grass, even the wind. It was all wrong. He debated going to go tell his teachers this immediately, but he couldn't bring himself to leave. And then it hit him, this was an area without magic. For whatever reason, it was devoid of the power that flowed through the world.

He wondered why, when the feelings of distress and worry increased..

Andrea narrowed her eyes and turned to the trees behind them seeing if she could find the path. The path they walked down was gone, Andrea turned to the rustling trees.

“Betty get behind me! Now!” she shouted and clicked the safety off of her gun, “Whose there?” she kept her hands steady and made sure her dog and her intern would behind her.

It all felt wrong, this whole clearing. It felt like nothing he had seen before. He watched, as wind began to touch it, the grass moved, and there was a foreign presence in the flora, and multiple stronger feelings. Living creatures.

He looked into the clearing, wondering what he would see.

Andrea steadied her hand, she had yet to truly use her gun for her own safety. True she made sure that she knew how to use it, she wasn’t going to get a gun and not know gun safety, and her family would kill her if she had a gun and went shooting it all willy nilly. Her finger was still not touching the trigger, pointed straight. The rustling growing louder and a growling started to grow.

Ace started to get up by her side slowly. He started to growl and hunker down by her side. A large roar yelled out as a mountain lion jumped out from behind the trees. The lioness and her dog growled at each other, and she was glad that she had Ace with her. She immediately shot her gun, aiming for specific points.

Each bullet landed and she watched as the tranqs took effect and the mountain lion fell to the ground. She let out a sigh of relief and turned to look at her intern behind her, but the trees started to rustle again.

Betty glanced at the lioness, glanced at the bunny, then glance at the person in the field.

Wait a minute. What person?

He stood to the side, just past some bushes looking very worried. He looked very pale, and had some interesting clothing, but there was only one thing on Betty's mind.

"He's tall. ...and why is he over here?"

She then poked the doctor lightly in the back, "Doc, who's that guy? Is he one of those ranger guys or something?"