Chapter 1 - Trapped

Pearl's head was pounding. A distinct ringing overwhelmed her ears as she opened her eyes painfully, a sickening smell of metal and mud emanated from the cold surroundings around her. It was so thick that she had trouble breathing and her chest felt tight.

'What the hell is going on?'

She looked at her surroundings wearily. She was in a car, in fact, she was in a car crash. Her head was bleeding and the dripping blood ran down her neck. The windshield was cracked and the front of the car was covered in dents, she was going to move herself forwards and get a good look but Pearl shivered at the realisation that a sharp tree branch had a jagged piece of wood aimed right at her throat.

Carefully, Pearl gripped the branch and pushed it out the way. 'I don't want to be a pincushion for a bunch of branches any time soon.' The branch moved with a loud creak before it tumbled out the window, breaking some more glass from the drivers window and cutting Pearl's hand. The tall girl winced slightly and cradled her injured palm against her chest.

It was a terrible time for the shock to set in.

'What happened? Where am I? How did I get here?' Pearl shivered.

It was pitch black outside the car, she could make out trees and heard the typical sounds a forest make in a horror film but otherwise there was no sort of recognisable sign or road around her.

Then… She heard a shuffle behind her.

Pearl was so preoccupied with what was outside the car, that she never paid attention to what was inside the crashed car. The interior mirrors were smashed and she couldn't see what was in the backseat with the one remaining exterior mirror that was across the empty passenger seat. She tried to hide her shaking hands and frightful gasps and bravely turned to face whatever terror awaited her.

It was a terror indeed.

A familiar girl sat in the backseat, a tree branch had pierced into her side and she was bleeding out slowly. It made Pearl's heart drop and she had to take a second look just to actually get a grip of what she was looking at.

She groaned in pain, a small whimper escaped her lips.

Pearl jumped and started to reach to the cars ceiling, feeling for the familiar light switch. She felt a wave of relief as she felt the small button and clicked it on, she could see the damage much more clearly now... And she wished she hadn't.

"Ugh." The girl scrunched her face in recoil to the light. Pearl watched her slowly open her eyes, a nice, deep, blue greeted her.

Like a spark of electricity she remembered the girls name.

"Lapis?!"

The girl scoffed in reply. "Where the hell am I?" She groaned and looked down, her hands shook as she touched her bleeding side and gasped as the blood covered her hand, "W-what happened?! W-why?" Her tanned skin went pale and she looked like she was going to faint.

"Calm down, it'll be okay!" Pearl tried, her hands up in a calming gesture.

"Like hell it will!" Lapis hissed and gripped the branch, "shit… I need to pull it out…"

"What?! No!" Pearl tried to move but just noticed the seatbelt that kept her secure to the drivers seat, she fumbled with the seatbelt. The blood from her cut made her grip slick and she couldn't grasp the buckle. Even when she managed to grab it she panicked once she seen the buckle was jammed. "L-Lapis don't pull it out!"

"Ugh, don't tell me what to do." Pearl looked back again and watched in horror as the girl bit her blood-stained shirt and yanked out the branch. It made a sickening 'crunch' and Lapis (although muffled) screamed in pain and she keeled over. "Shit!"

Pearl looked around the car and reached to the best of her ability to the car compartment. She yanked it open as well as she could with her bloody hand and grinned when she seen tissues and handkerchiefs laid out neatly inside. Pearl grabbed a handful and threw it back to Lapis, then she wrapped some of the fabric around her hand tightly.

Lapis was panting behind her as she pressured the wound with some of the tissues. Pearl felt sick, she could feel her throat tightening and knees shake.

Lapis Lazuli.

Of all people it had to be her sitting in the back seat.

It wasn't like she never liked Lapis, it was that the other girl never liked her. Pearl was slightly guilty of that fact, perhaps she even was even more that 'slightly' guilty of why Lapis couldn't stand her presence. She clenched her hands painfully. 'No point thinking about what happened… It's not going to get me out of here.'

A rumble brought her back to reality.

Pearl' eyes shot up and glanced around the darkness, another grumble caused her to gasp, she reached up and turned the interior light off with a hurried 'click'.

"W-what are you-?"

"Shhh!" Pearl silenced Lapis and focused on outside.

It sounded like footsteps…

Pearl tried to hide into the drivers seat but the seatbelt made that difficult, the grumbling came closer and she could hear branches snap and trees groan. The wind also started to pick up.

'All I need is a storm to start right now…' Pearl grumbled, she heard the screaming of metal behind her as the grumbling grew louder. It was as if something was scratching the car outside. She shut her eyes and her hands covered her mouth.
Tears escaped her eyes as all she could think of was 'I'm going to die, this is it!'

She held her breath desperately as it approached her car door.

But then the sounds of shuffling and grumbling stopped and she could only hear heavy breathing. It wasn't Lapis, she knew that for a fact, it was low and guttural. It sounded almost like an animal wheezing. Whatever it was, it was poking it's face into the window. Pearl was dying to get her breath back as the creature grumbled beside her, she stayed desperately still as if trying to look dead.

She shuddered as the thudding and grumbling began again but grew quiet and slowly diminished.
Pearl opened her eyes again and looked round, nothing had changed. She gasped and wheezed in lungfuls of air.

Nothing changed… Yet at the same time everything changed.

They weren't safe, not here and definitely not out there.

They were trapped in the car, in the middle of the forest, in the dark.

Pearl looked back to Lapis, her head was hanging back on the seat and her limp hands weakly stopped her bleeding.

They stared at each other for a moment. Too scared to say anything, too weak to say anything.
It was a risk to turn the light on again and Pearl looked at the light switch ominously.

"What do we do?" Pearl whispered and brought her hands to her face. it didn't stop her shivering and only made her head pound even more.

"Well, we can't go anywhere now can we?" Lapis groaned painfully, "Let's… ugh… L-lets just try and remember what happened."

"Right…" Pearl breathed out, closing her eyes, "What happened…"