The cackling of the fire was the only sound that could be heard, and its light was soothing and warm in the darkness that surrounded the little camp. Well, calling it a camp would be a bit more dramatic than it had the right to be. A good sized fire was surrounded by a square of tree logs used for sitting on. That was it.

That was where Point Man and his new friends were sitting, waiting for the inevitable to happen.

This wasn't the first time any of them had been here, and as long as the Entity was around it wouldn't be the last. PM was staring at the fire with focus, something he had acquired in his years of military training. He wasn't worried about what had happened before, he was looking forward to the next battle. That helped ease his mind when the blood started falling.

Because he couldn't, or wouldn't speak, he was more akin to letting the four others speak instead. Dwight was okay, his wounds fully healed after the last trial, and he was in a rather envious position. He was laying on the ground next to the fire, but his head rested on the lap of a beautiful country girl who went by the name of Kate Denson. She was a musician of sorts, and the last time PM had seen her she had been strumming her guitar that somehow had made it through the fog and to the camp. She would play it to help soothe the other survivors souls. Dwight seemed to be in heaven with the way he had a casual grin on his face, his thick rimmed glasses lying on the ground next to him.

The other two survivors were new to PM. One was a boy in dark clothes and shaggy brown hair named Quentin, the other an older woman by the name of Jane. She looked like a business executive or a celebrity with the way she wore her suit. But she had a cocky grin for some reason.

They spoke about a lot of things, most of which went over PM like a shooting star. Being the social recluse he was due to his upbringing in a lab he wasn't much of a talker. Well, he couldn't speak at all. On a physical note he could but growing up he had been told to listen and not open his mouth. He had been trained to let his fists do the talking.

Too bad his fists were practically useless in a place like this, where escape was the only means to survive.

"So, what's your story?"

PM moved his eyes in Quentin's direction and, for the first time since he had returned to the camp, he relaxed his shoulders.

"You don't talk much, do you?"

PM shook his head before bringing the tips of his fingers to where his larynx was and shaking his head again.

Quentin seemed to understand. "Oh, can't speak, eh? That fucking sucks."

The boy through a pile of dead grass into the fire.

"What I wouldn't give to be free of this place."

"You been here awhile?" These words came from Jane.

"Too long, though my watch stopped working I couldn't say how long I have been here, but it feels like years..." answered Quentin.

PM had to agree. Any sense of time seemed to disappear in this place. Unless it was during a trial there was never a sun in the sky, and at the camp it was always a full moon. The weather would change only in the trials, though there were the occasional snow and simmering heat at the camp. He guessed the Entity didn't like uniformity or things getting stale.

"Wonder how Nancy is doing..." said Quentin.

"She your girlfriend?" Asked Jane, which was what PM would have asked just out of curiosity.

Quentin nodded, "Pretty much. We go to the same school together. Have been since preschool."

School... PM wondered, since he had never been around kids other than his younger brother Paxton, he didn't know what it was like to be in a school. A school of hard knocks was all he knew. One where blood and violence played a role in what you were to become.

"We were separated the last time I had seen her. Hopefully she got away. I'd hate to see her in a place like this." Quentin reached into his back pocket and pulled a picture out of his wallet. He handed it to Jane. PM guessed it was a picture of the girl they were talking about.

Jane seemed impressed. "She's a looker, kid. Good catch."

Quentin was handed back the picture and he handed it to PM. The older man took a quick glance at it, seeing a smiling and beautiful teenage girl on it before handing it back.

"You said you were separated, you were running from something?" Asked Jane.

"Not something. Someone." Quentin visibly shook, like just thinking about it made his body quiver in fear. "Freddy Krueger. Some bastard who wanted revenge on me and Nancy."

"You must have done something big to piss him off," this time the words came from Kate, the light of the fire reflecting off her eyes as she joined in on the conversation.

To the surprise of everyone Quentin chuckled nervously. "It goes well beyond just 'pissing him off', I was the reason he was killed." Quentin shook his head and rubbed his eyes. He looked like he hadn't slept in days. "He was a monster in more ways than one before, but after he was killed he came back as something much worse. Haunting the dreams of me and my friends when we slept, and he killed them. Only Nancy and I managed to get away...for a moment. Next thing I know, I'm here in this place and Freddy is too."

"How do you know?"

To answer Kate's question Quentin looked right at her. "It's just a feeling I have. I doze off in a game, and I can feel he's near. That's all I can say to explain it."

Listening to Quentin's story PM couldn't help but agree. Like the boy, someone he knew was in the trials, though he had yet to see her in the flesh. His mother, Alma Wade.

Though his abilities as a psychic were extremely low in comparison, Pm still had a link to his mother's mind that grew in strength whenever they were close. From past experiences he knew when she was near. Blurry vision, migraines, and even seeing hallucinations. She'd be there one moment, then gone the next, stalking him like a lioness with its prey. But he knew she wouldn't hurt him. Granted she had tried when he had begun his last mission, but that was before he had learned she was his mother. After that, her attacks stopped completely, but she would occasionally appear as if to check up on him, and he would sometime hear her voice though the words were sometimes garbled by the distortions that came with her projections.

"I'm getting sick of these games though, I want to go home." Said Dwight, his eyes closed while lying on Kate's lap.

While Quentin and Jane agreed, as did Kate, PM was no longer paying attention to them. Instead he was looking off into the distance. There was a thick layer of fog slowly approaching the camp. While anywhere else it wouldn't be given a second thought, in the Entity's realm the Fog was a signal that yet another trial was going to happen.

PM knew this and got on his feet, fists tightly clenched. The others saw him get up but didn't say a word as the fog began to close in around them. They didn't even try to plead with the Entity to give them respite, for they knew it would be useless. The next trial was set to begin, whether they liked it or not.

The only question was: who would bring the pain to add to their torment?