Mae and her friend group walked down the long concrete sidewalk that led up to Angus's apartment, leading the group was Angus who had, despite his asthma, managed to get ahead of them. The only things illuminating the sidewalks and the streets were the various lamp posts that towered over the concrete pathways, of course there was the occasional car with it's headlights on that would drive by and bath the group in light when it did, the dark almost unlit sidewalk, the sounds of nature, and the night sky all combined together was almost hypnotic. Everyone was sleepy and they were practically dragging their feet as they walked, all except for Mae who was practically skipping as if she wasn't tired at all, which she probably wasn't, she never really got tired unless she got sick or if she laid herself down on a bed for a minute or two, Bea was walking along side Mae and she had a cigarette in her mouth, Bea would occasionally look over to Mae and watch her for a little bit, as she watched she'd become both amused and annoyed all at once. She was amused because despite Mae's age she still acted like a kid, and she was annoyed because just watching Mae still be filled with so much energy made Bea all the more tired, she was also pretty cold, she had her arms wrapped around her chest and was almost shivering, the only source of heat in her entire body was the cigarette that rested between her lips but that was slowly burning away, like it was supposed to, but even though it was supposed to burn away it still made Bea angry, it was about the only thing keeping her from shivering like a chihuahua.

Mae looked over to Bea "You okay BeaBea?"

Bea hadn't noticed it yet but she'd started to shiver a little more then she had before, and it must've been noticeable, "Yeah I'm fine. Or I will be fine once we get inside."

Angus looked over his should and at Bea "Don't worry we're almost there."

Bea smiled "Alright, thanks."

She then took a drag off of her cigarette and puffed it's smoke out of her mouth, finishing off her cigarette her only source of warmth, she tossed the butt of the cigarette down onto the ground and rubbed this sides of her body trying to warm herself up "I know it's Autumn, I know that it's night time, but what I don't get is why it's so damn cold!.. It never got this cold back at Possum Springs!"

Angus nodded "Yeah, so the wind that comes into town rolls over the lake, which is always cold during both Autumn and Winter, and into town bringing the cold with it."

Lori muttered under her breath "Stupid lake and wind."

She too had her arms wrapped around herself trying to keep herself warm, Selmers and Mae shrugged but Mae was the first to speak up "Never been all that affected by the cold."

Selmers then said "And I'm covered from head to toe with thick fur so I don't get cold, I get really effing hot."

Angus nodded "Same here."

Bea shivered slightly as she said "Well you two are lucky, hell all of you are lucky, Lori maybe cold but she's not as cold as I am. I don't got any fur just scales, and they are super cold and heat absorbent."

Mae smiled slightly "Doesn't help you're not wearing Autumn clothes.. Besides scales are cool, they get to shimmer and shine in the day light! And they're so smooth that any kind of liquid that you spill on yourself just rolls right off!"

Bea sighed "And right onto your clothes, you may think scales are cool, but fur is better. It's so soft, and comfortable, not only that but you can dye it all sorts of colors."

Selmers looked over to Bea "Can't you get your scales painted, isn't that like getting fur dyed?"

Bea shook her head "No, paint lasts for a day or two, dyed fur can last forever. Just ask Mae, that little tuft of dyed fur on the top of her head has been there since she was six."

Lori looked over to Mae "Wait really?"

Mae nodded "Oh yeah, I had seen this cool kid in school with dyed hair and wanted it myself but my parents wouldn't let me get anything dyed... But my granddad was perfectly fine with it."

Selmers grinned "Your granddad sounds like a really cool guy Mae."

She nodded "Yep, he's the best granddad in Possum Springs... Or he was."

Lori raised and eyebrow in confusion "Was?"

Mae nodded sadly "Yeah, was. He passed away when I was nine."

Selmers sighed "Damn, that sucks... I would've liked to have met him."

Mae smiled "He was a nice guy, despite the fact he'd occasionally do things with me without my parent's permission he was a nice guy, he got along with them a lot, he was also nice to all of my friends, including Bea. He actually had a little notch in his ear like mine."

Once she mentioned her right ear's notch it twitched emphasizing what she said. Lori snapped her fingers "That reminded me, how did you get that notch in your ear?"

Mae shrugged "I was young and dumb."

Bea then added "Still are."

But Mae continued talking and ignored her "One day I was walking home from Bea's alone, cuz I was a badass kid, and a stray dog walked by me, and me being a young kid I chased after it so I could pet it, well after a little while of chasing it suddenly stopped and I did too, I feel down onto the ground face fist, but that wasn't the worst of it, that stupid dog then bit down on my ear. It took a minute or two for someone to come and help me, that same stranger took me back to my house and my parents rushed me to a nearby hospital, and they had to remove the bits that were still hanging on."

Everyone stopped when Mae told them about how she got her ear damaged, Angus looked at her "That sounds traumatizing."

Mae nodded "Yeah it kinda was, but I got this cool notch in my ear from it!"

She then wiggled her right ear several times a big smile on her face, as everyone started to walk again Lori looked over to Mae "How'd your granddad get his notch?"

Mae shrugged "Never really told me anything other than it was a mining accident."

Selmers chuckled "Must've been really blood and gruesome if he didn't tell you the full story, and it also seems like the whole notch in your ear thing is a family trait."

Mae grinned "Guess so."

Right as she finished her sentence she had a sickening thought. The only people in the whole of Possum Springs she'd seen with a notch in their ear was herself, her granddad, and Eide the guy that had tried to kill her in the mines last year, could he be, no, no her granddad died when she was nine, she went to his funeral, she had the worst luck a nine year old could get and watched him die, Eide couldn't have been her granddad, he wasn't even the same body type, Eide was to slim to be her granddad, and again her granddad died long before Eide started doing things, at least she thinks it was a long time before he started kidnapping people. He'd sounded pretty young to her, so he must've been at least twenty to thirty years old, Eide wasn't her grandfather, he couldn't be him, he was to young, and slim, and... evil, to be her grandfather, he had to "Mae you okay?"

She looked over to Bea who had knocked her out of Mae's trance "Uh, y- yeah I'm fine."

Bea nodded and shivered "You didn't look fine to me, you were staring at the pavement as if it had insulted your entire life."

Mae smirked slightly "Nah I was just thinking."

Bea looked forwards again and said "That's dangerous."

Mae then yelled out "Hey!"

But before she could say anything else the sound of something being slam onto the ground rung through the silent city, Mae hadn't noticed before but they were standing next to a big parking garage, it was mostly empty, and the sound had come from in there, the sound had made everyone stop dead in their tracks out of either fear or curiosity. Mae stared at the almost pitch black interior of the parking garage "What was that?"

Angus shrugged "No idea, but that is directly next to a shopping mall, could've been someone setting something down on the ground."

Mae looked over to Angus a look of disbelief on her face "Really, really hardly?"

Angus nodded "Must've been heavy."

Bea also stared into the parking garage's interior "Doesn't matter what was being slammed onto the ground, all that matters is that it doesn't effect us."

Selmers nodded "Yeah you're right, let's get going."

Everyone then walked away from the parking garage, all except for Mae who stood there still staring at the it in curiosity, she quickly glanced over to her friends who hadn't noticed that Mae wasn't there yet, then back to the parking garage, her friends, the garage, friends, garage. Mae silently said to herself "Just... A quick look around, I'm agile, I can get out of there and back to my friends in no time."

She then sprinted into the parking garage determined to find the source of that slamming sound, Bea heard the sound of someone running behind her, she looked over her shoulder and caught a quick look of Mae as she ran into the parking garage "Goddammit Mae, guys! Mae ran into the parking garage!"

Everyone then turned back around and went into the parking garage after Mae. She looked around the parking garage, she was only on the ground floor and from what she saw outside it had about three to four floors other than the ground level, it was dark inside of the garage so it was hard to see in front of herself but she could see that there was a line of cars parked in front of her, they all lined up to create a wall that prevented her from seeing past them. Just then someone grabbed Mae's shoulder and she quickly spun around to see that Bea had grabbed it "Mae, for the third time today, what did we say about running off without telling anyone, also. Why the heck are you in here?"

Mae let out a sigh of relief, Bea had really scared her when she grabbed Mae's shoulder "I don't know, I guess I just thought that maybe it had something to do with Gregg."

Angus, who was standing next to Bea, shook his head "No, this parking garage is nowhere near the Sports Depot."

Mae sighed "I know, I just thought-"

She was suddenly cut off by someone turning on some sort of light source, Mae turned around and saw that the light was coming from behind the line of parked cars, that must've been where the sound had come from. She quickly dashed over to the cars and hid in between the two that were closest to the light source, she looked through the windows of the car that sat on her right and saw that a red and orange bird dressed in a blue hoodie, black shorts, and blue sandals was talking to a crocodile that was wearing a white tee shirt, blank athletic pants that had a red strip running along both it's sides, and white sneakers. There was something sitting in between the two other people but before Mae could see what it was Bea suddenly whispered to Mae "What are you doing?!"

Mae looked over to Bea, who was crouched down next to Mae, slightly annoyed and shocked "These guys are being sketchy."

Bea raised an eyebrow in confusion "So what?! None of this matters to you!"

Angus, who was crouched down behind Bea, poked his head over her and nodded "Yeah, like I said before there's a shopping mall on the other side of this parking garage, they're probably just handling some heavy stuff they bought in there."

Mae shook her head "That doesn't explain why they lit up a lantern, or why they're just standing there."

Selmers, who was crouched down behind Lori who was crouched down behind Angus, looked through the car's windows and was able to see what was in between the other two people "Hey, they got a big black duffel bag just sitting on the ground. Looks like it's open too."

Mae looked back through the car's windows and saw the bird squat down to take something out of the duffel bag, and as he did Mae suddenly jumped out from her cover confronting them. As Mae confronted the two guys Bea tried to grab her shirt but she was too slow, once Mae jumped up from out of the cover she yelled out "Hey! Stop what ever it is you're doing!"

The croc spun around and looked at Mae, he physically recoiled from her out of shock and fear, but the fear was a kind of fear Mae had only seen once before. It was the kind of fear that Andy Cullen had after the Incident when she was younger, the fear of being near her because she was dangerous, or could be dangerous, except his expression was more of "I've been told to not be near you" something Mae had also seen before, as for the bird. When Mae confronted them he had his hand inside of the duffel bag searching for something, but when she yelled at them he stood upright a look of shock on his face that had a slight twinge of fear in it, not as much as the croc but it was there. Bea tried her best to silently get Mae to come to her, to hid again, but Mae would just glance over to her when ever she made a gesture of "Get over here now" and the bird took notice of it, he could tell that Mae kept on looking at someone that was hiding behind a car, he then suddenly shoved his hand into his hoodie's pocket and pulled out a handgun, he aimed it at Mae trying his best to make it obvious for the others "Who ever's over there! Stand up and walk to the cat slowly!"

Mae's friends followed the bird's demands, they stood up and walked over to Mae. Once the other croc saw Bea he stepped even farther away from Mae his look of utter fear growing as he did "Shit shit shit shit, I- I- I- I- I gotta, fuck, I gotta go."

He then ran out of the parking garage, as he ran the bird yelled to him "Dammit Eli! Get back here!"

The bird then glared at Mae and her friends, the look of shock and slight fear now gone, it was instead replaced with a look of rage "Do you know how much money you just coast me?! What the hell are you guys doing in here?! Nobody's walking around town at this time of night!"

Bea raised her hands up in a non-threatening manner "We're.. Not from around here, uh, we'll leave you alone and-"

The bird shook his head "No, you aren't leaving here anytime soon, not until you pay me what Eli was gonna pay me."

Angus stepped forwards trying his hardest to prevent his large size from being intimidating "How much was he gonna pay you?"

The bird crouched down, his gun still pointed at them, and started to riffle through it "See that's the thing, we agreed that one of each these would be worth about fifty dollars, but he wasn't sure how much he actually wanted. So if he wanted two he'd have to pay me one hundred dollars, and seeing as how I have a new shipment coming in next week, I need to sell about half of this... So, I'll need."

He then started to silently do the math in his head "...Fifty thousand dollars, for half of this."

He then held up a bottle of pain medication. Mae could see out of the corner of her eye that Selmers looked nauseous when the bird showed them the pain meds, Angus was about to reach into his pocket to grab his wallet but Bea stopped him and she pulled out her credit card "Just, take it."

The bird stood up and haphazardly tossed the bottle back into the duffel bag "Nope not gonna cut it, I need physical money."

Angus then reached back into his pocket and pulled out his wallet, he opened it up and started to riffle through it trying to scrounge up as much money as he could. After a few seconds of him searching around Angus pulled out thirty dollars and twelve cents "This is all I have in physical money and change." the bird took Angus's money and after he tucked it inside of his hoodie pocket he pointed his gun at Bea "Now you." Bea backed away slightly "What? But-" the bird then cut her off "Like I said before I need fifty thousand dollars, and you're gonna fork up fifty thousand dollars or else." Bea stared at the handgun's barrel in fear "Can't we work something out? I- I run a store back in Possum Springs, I c- can like hook you up with some-"

"No you can't hook me up with something I live in Florida, I only come to Michigan when my little business needs me to."

Bea became more and more fearful as time went on "Yeah b- but, I could like mail you the money you need or-"

Before even hearing the "or" option the bird said "I'll take or.. As in or else."

He then walked over to Bea and started to forcefully pull out her wallet, Angus wanted desperately to stop either the bird from taking Bea's wallet or Bea from struggling against him "Can't we just, we could, why don't."

He didn't have a single idea on what to do about the situation. Bea grabbed the bird's free wrist which caused him to point his gun's barrel at Bea's chin "Let go."

Mae, fueled with rage, suddenly picked up a piece of rock debris that must've come of the tire of a car and bashed it against his knee, she then shoved him away from Bea and stood in between the two of them. The bird aimed his gun at Mae "You little-"

She then threw the rock at his head and it him in between his eyes right above his beak, the sudden attack and it's pain caused him to back away from Mae causing the distance in between the two of them to grow from a few inches to a couple feet, the bird looked back over to Mae his grip growing tighter on the gun as he aimed it at her "How stupid are you." Mae grinned slightly feeling confidence inside of herself "I could ask you the same question."

The bird glared at Mae angrily and spoke through his teeth "You asked for it." he then pulled the gun's trigger and all of Mae's confidence melted away. Everything around her seemed to slow down, all of the colors around her grew more vibrant, she felt numb all over as if she were having an out of body experience, the lantern started to flicker despite it being at full power just a few seconds ago, just as the lantern started to flicker all of the cars started to go haywire, their lights flickered, their horns honked, they kept on locking and unlocking themselves, everyone's phones started to flicker on and off, random notifications popped up on them causing their alert sounds to continuously go off, and all while all of that started to happen the parking garage's lights also started to flicker on and off, all of that happened while everything around Mae seemed to be in slow-motion so Mae had no clue how it looked or sounded for everyone else. As everything flickered and sounded off and the bullet that the bird fired at Mae flew towards her, everyone started to panic out of both fear for Mae and the confusion of what was happening around them, suddenly and with no explanation Mae, who was just standing there a blank expression on her face as a bullet flew towards her, suddenly blasted out some sort of shock wave that didn't knock anyone off their feet, it actually felt like a light breeze, but the shock wave caused the once speeding bullet to fall to the ground devoid of all momentum. The bird looked at Mae in complete fear, then another shock wave came from Mae and the gun's magazine suddenly fell out and landed on the ground.

Once it fell onto the ground the bullets inside of the magazine's clip started to pop like firecrackers, they didn't cause any harm to anyone but they did fill the parking garage with the smell of gun powder, then yet another shock wave came from Mae this time it caused the bird's handgun to completely fall apart and as that shock wave came from Mae the chaos of the various electrical devices that surrounded everyone in the parking garage started to grow stronger. The bird looked at the pieces of his gun that still sat in his hand, a look of true fear on his face, he then looked over to Mae who looked like she was on the verge of passing out from boredom, he slowly backed away from Mae "Wh- Wh- What are you!?"

He then turned around and ran from Mae, but she then let out another shock wave that caused the black duffel bag to zip itself shut and then it was flung at the bird by an invisible force, the bird was knocked off balance by the duffel bag so he scrambled to recover and pick up the bag so he could continue to run away, Mae's head followed the bird as he ran out of the parking garage and once he left the lights stopped flickering, the cars stopped locking and unlocking themselves, the phones all stopped alerting their owns of various things, and Mae collapsed. Bea caught Mae before she could hit the ground, Bea placed her hand on the side of Mae's head and made the cat look at her "Mae? Mae?! MAE?!"

Her eyes fluttered as they tried desperately to keep themselves open "BeaBea?"

Mae's eyes then closed and she passed out in Bea's arms. Mae then opened her eyes, she was standing in the middle of a bus station, she was standing in the middle of Possum Springs's bus station, she was standing next to the mural that falsely portrayed the town. Mae looked over to her left and saw Gregg sitting on a bench, he was wearing the same clothes he usually wore a black leather jacket, grey undershirt, blue jeans, and a pair of navy colored boots, Mae walked over to Gregg and before she said or did anything he said "Despite the town's small size I have a lot of good memories here. Heh, kind wish you would've found me sooner, then I could've made some good memories in Bright Harbor."

Gregg then disappeared in a small puff of white steam. When Gregg disappeared instead of feeling sad she just felt... nothing, she then turned back around and saw an orange furred cat, wearing a black hoodie, dark blue jeans, and black sneakers, sitting on the bench that sat on the right side of the mural, that cat was also one of Mae's best friends Casey Arnold Hartley, she walked over to Casey and sat down next to him. Without looking over to Mae he said "How have you been?"

Mae shrugged "I've been better."

Casey slowly nodded as he stuck his hand into his hoodie's pocket "How so?"

Mae sighed "Well, Gregg went missing yesterday, we spent the entirety of today searching for him but we only found out that this guy named Steve Scriggins knows Bea, and his brother and parents live in Bright Harbor over their family restaurant. And while we were heading back to Angus's apartment I did something stupid."

He then pulled out his meth pipe as he put his other hand into his other hoodie pocket "You're gonna need to be more specific than that."

She grinned "You sound like Bea."

He then pulled his lighter out of his other hoodie pocket "How's that?"

Mae looked over to Casey "Well the both of you think I'm immature."

He nodded "Aren't you?"

She rolled her eyes "Yeah whatever... But back to what we were talking about before, the stupid thing I did was that I ran into a parking garage after a dumb sound perked my curiosity. Well the cause of that sound was a drug dealer or something and me being really bad at making choices I tried to confront them, then that drug dealer guy pulled a gun on us and long story short he tried to shoot me, then.."

Casey looked over to Mae "Then what?"

Mae continued "Then I passed out, so I don't know what happened afterwards."

He made a "Huh" noise as he started to light his meth pipe "Well, you don't seem to be dead.. And I'd know what being dead is like."

He was having some trouble lighting his meth pipe, each time he brought his lighter to up to the pipe it's little flame went out, Mae suddenly blurted out "Are you real?"

Casey looked over to Mae slightly confused "What do you mean?"

Mae shrugged "Well, I've had weirder dream-visions before so you just being a figment of my imagination wouldn't be that weird too me."

He then looked back over to his pipe and tried to light it again "Well, does it matter if I'm real or not?"

She shrugged again "I don't know, I guess not.. It'd just make me fell better if you were real, despite the fact that would mean I can talk to the dead."

He finally lit his pipe and a smile of satisfaction grew appeared on his face "But if I weren't real that'd mean I'm a figment of your imagination and or a combination of your memories trying to tell you something, and if I were a figment that'd mean that I'm like your imaginary friend and they can be cool, or if I'm a jumbled mess of your memories that means I'm full of your favorite and best memories about me."

Mae nodded "Yeah I guess so."

Casey then put the pipe in his mouth and took a drag off of it, or whatever you do it smoke a meth pipe, Mae doesn't know how to smoke anything let alone a meth pipe, once Casey let out a puff of smoke from his mouth he said "No matter what, don't let your bad memories taint your good memories, and of course never forget me, deal?"

Casey held his hand out for Mae to shake it, she then grabbed his hand and shook it "Got it."

He then disappeared in a puff of white vapor that smelled like smoke. Mae stood up from the bench and her grandfather walked past her, she then jogged over to him and walked next to him "It's been awhile granddad."

Her grandfather nodded "Sure has."

Mae didn't know what to say, not because she was overwhelmed with all sorts of confusing feeling due to her seeing her dead grandfather again, no, she just couldn't think of anything. Eventually Mae finally thought of something "How's grandma?"

Her grandfather shrugged "Same old, same old. She still wants me to fix that fan in the bathroom."

She looked over to her grandfather in slight confusion "You still live inside the house?"

Her grandfather shook his head "No not really, it's more of a memory. Nothing ever changes no matter what we do, which makes fixing that fan."

She chuckled slightly "I bet."

They then reached the bus station's front door and her grandfather placed his hand on it's handle "Welp, I'll be seeing you latter kitten."

Mae waved to her grandfather "Bye."

He then pushed open the door and walked out, he too disappeared in a puff of white vapor. Mae stared out the glass door, there wasn't anything outside of it except for a large slab of concrete that the bus station sat on top of, she then turned back around and everything changed, the bus station looked like it had been ravaged by a tornado, then a riot, then an earth quake, the mural of misrepresentation was demolished and the only thing left of it was it's wooden frame, the right bench was split in half, the front desk had a massive hole in it, the TV that sat above the front desk was smashed in, there were holes in the station's roof, and scattered all over the floor was pebbles and rocks of varying sizes. Standing in the middle of the bus station, in front of Mae, was a tall man who wore a large dark red cloak that had a hood which was flipped up and covered the top of his head, he was also wearing a pair of dark black work boots, the clocked man then turned his head and looked at Mae which showed her that he was also wearing gas mask that had a broken filtration device that made it look like he had a crocodile's muzzle. The man then turned completely around and faced Mae revealing that he didn't have a right arm or a right sleeve "You."

It was Eide, the cultist that tried to kill Mae last year in the mines, but Mae didn't feel scared or threatened, she felt the same way she felt when she first woke up in the bus station, she felt meh, Eide stomped over to Mae and stood a few inches away from her "You've caused me so much trouble.. Too much trouble."

He then grabbed Mae by her neck with his left hand, he lifted her up off the ground but she still felt nothing, he then walked over to the glass door and tossed her through it, right as she broke through the door she was flooded with fear, anger, sadness, and confusion. Tears welled up in her eyes as she fell into the endless black void that surrounded the bus station, she tried to scream out for help but she couldn't get any air into her lungs each time she opened her mouth, the only sounds that she could hear was the sound of wind rushing by her as she fell. She continued to fall the bus station slowly shrinking as she fell, it just kept shrinking and shrinking until it was gone leaving her alone in a pure black void, she kept on falling unable to do anything, afraid of what might happen to her, when suddenly she stopped in midair. She looked downwards and saw more endless void, she looked upwards and saw even more endless void, she was still surrounded by the black void yet she was just floating in place, then she heard a deep male voice say something behind her "Borowski."

She then turned around and saw the Black Goat standing on air right behind her, a wicked grin on his face "I see you've fallen into some troubling times. Any questions you may have as to what happened, I can gladly answer for you."

He then clapped his hands and the two of them disappeared.