I just hope I can improve everything here and then never leave again. I refuse to suffer at the hands of people at school, at home or on the streets again, but I know eventually it's inevitable whether it's here or back on earth. More people arrive, which makes me feel antsy and my insides quake at the idea of being around this many people. But just as wars are started by people, they're also ended by them too, so we need people on our side and plenty of them or we're more than likely going to lose this fight before it's even begun.

I meet Tremity Knight who seems to be an elemental vampire and can control every element known to man, individual, woman, and child. He seems a bit shy, and isn't very talkative, but I like him, because he's not intrusive or in your face about his thoughts, beliefs, or personality like so many others are. Leira Lynx who is a half Shadow lust demon and half Shape shifting day walking vampire. She's very broody, but I think that just comes with her nature...I hope. Then there's Charles Donovan, a werewolf by night, and human by day. He's actually quite funny, and was telling dirty jokes mostly, he reminds me of my dad, but only his humour; the similarities end there fortunately for me. Hana Hasáko has to be the cutest little witch ever. She's shy, but in a low self esteem wallflower kind of way, and she's incredibly sweet, and generous among other things. She brought us all snacks that she made at home, and then hugged everyone including me, although she does that to everyone she meets apparently.

Melanie never turned up though, I guess in order to get her here she would have to trust them not to hurt her like that again. I totally understand where she's coming from though, especially when I have been betrayed by former friends in the past as well, and it's hard to see that person as a friend after that. I know she'll come around someday, although I do kinda wish I could have met her today; from what I heard she sounds like an awesome person, and I'm disappointed I couldn't meet her yet. I do wonder if she got an apology though for what was done to her, even though I am fuzzy on the details, it must have been pretty bad for her to ignore Shadow and Storm's mind messages. 

We all introduce ourselves and then we sit around getting to know each other while eating snacks together. It was mainly junk food, but we're teenagers, and sometimes the stereotypes are true about us. Once it begins to get late into the afternoon though we start to discuss what our next move should be. Shadow turns to me and gestured that I had the floor this time. I used a wand someone handed me, which might have been Hana's come to think of it, and etched it into the sand on the cave floor; mapping it all out. We made changes along the way over things that wouldn't work with the resources we have, and with a concrete plan we devise when to do it.

“One thing for sure is that Shadow's dad is at the forefront of all this." I state, “Therefore, I think if we get rid of him I think everyone else will fall in line, and won't cause us any more bother.” 

“We can't kill him!” Shadow yells. We all turn to look at him in outrage, but my face; I have no idea what my expression is. “What? Shadow says awkwardly, “He's still my dad guys!" 

“Who abuses you whenever he wants to!" Tremity replies in outrage. “But he helped bring me into this world." He stubbornly says. “You don't owe him your life though!" Leira shouts back at him.

“I hate to say it, but Leira is right, Shadow, why keep him around if all he does is hurt you?" I utter.

We all fall into an awkward silence after what I just said, but they all know I spoke the utmost truth. I just wish I could follow my own words sometimes, because what I said just now implies I'm a hypocrite when I haven't done the same thing. I want to, my gods do I want to, but I'm 16 years old and my parents would never let me live without them at least until I'm 18. Thank the gods I don't have to worry about it anymore now that I'm in a different stratosphere entirely and away from them. Shadow looks stressed out over the decision, so I offer two options, and already know which one he's going to pick before I even voice the words. 

“Okay, I get why you might be struggling with this somewhat, but we either kill your dad, or we find a non-killing option instead and subdued him another way." I offer. He mulls it all over and I can almost see the gears turning in his head before he looks at me and says, “We're not killing him, we'll go with option 2." He confirms. Everybody else groans in unison, but I don't, because I know that someday he'll come to realise that he made the wrong choice. When that judgement day comes I just hope he can live with that fact and that nobody loses their lives because of it. “Alright, then that's what we will do." I mutter, “Now we just need to figure out what we're going to do, and how we're going to subdue him.” 

“I hope your dad's human, otherwise this job will be a lot harder if he isn't." I joke. Everyone tries to avoid looking at me, the situation becomes uncomfortable for me, and I know with utter certainty before Shadow even opens his mouth that his dad is indeed not human. Shadow looks across at me and says the words I needed to hear, but wish I didn't, “He's an Erinyes Shadow demon, and he's one of the most difficult to kill, if we did kill him we'd need a demon blade powerful enough to do it, and even then there's no guarantee, because he can use shadows to disappear too."

“Sombre words bring sober thoughts”, as they say in the UK, and that quote has never been more true than it is right now. I don't know how I got myself into this utter cluster fuck of grand proportions, but I'm here now and I know I can't leave them all in the lurch when they're here to help me not get caught by this planet's own version of cops. “Okay, so...w-we j-just n-need to research weapons or things we can use to trap a demon like him and go from there, right?" I stammer. Charlie chimes in with, “Yeah, we could perform a ritual and send him back to hell?" I look at him and realise that just because he's blonde does not mean he's dumb, he has more than proven that throughout this meeting. “We could do that, but we're going to need supplies and stuff to use for if the plan fails.” Shadow says. “Yes a contingency plan, we should have a few back up plans in case Shadow fucks this up and tells his dad too!" Tremity announces. Shadow then glares at Tremity, however we're already getting back to the discussion stage again. 

Everyone is assigned tasks to complete for operation: Save the day; I didn't name it, Charlie did, but it's fine, who cares what the name is? All we really need is to succeed afterall, and grab supplies to pull it off of course. 

The gang are all packing up and getting ready to head out when Shadow suddenly begins to scream and writhe on the ground.

We all turn to stare at him, and Leira cries out in fear, it looks like the demon himself has found Shadow, and unfortunately us by default. What the fuck do we do now? We're so irrevocably screwed!

I can sense a dark presence on the beach, but one I recognise from when I was a little kid, the shadow man himself is here, and he's coming into the cave right this second! Gregar! The bane of my existence, he tried to kill me years ago, but failed, and now he's here? I sent him back to where he came from, but clearly it sent him back to where he was born instead of hell like I thought, which means it's my fault he's here, my problem, and I'm the reason this place is falling to wreck and ruin. 

I need to do something quickly, he can't find my hideout, or I'm screwed and so are my new friends. I decide to cast a spell that shrouds us, and sends us elsewhere, away from Shadow and his dad. We end up falling to the ground of a mossy grassy meadow in some kind of forest or wood, and we're safe for now. We all groan as we land on hard ground, and slowly sit up. Now that we're safely away from Greygar's clutches I can't help but think of Shadow and fear for his safety. What is his crazy dad doing to him, is he back there torturing him, and will he be okay afterwards?

While I ponder all this, Leira is trying to get a signal on her phone but to no avail. Phone signals can be iffy in the woods sometimes especially if phone towers are out of range. This forest actually reminded me of snow white for some reason, but I can't fathom as to why that is. I feel the ground shift beneath me and the trees twist their gnarled branches like clawed hands. Then I realise where we are. I brought us to the dark forest itself, the stuff of nightmares, monsters and ghouls live here. I have doomed us all, why did I bring them here?! Tenebris Malum forest is a hellscape and not easy to escape, however I know I do, which means I'm their best chance of getting out of here. So, screw self pity, and screw my parents too for good measure, because I am good enough and I can do amazing things. I might not be great at the academic crap, but I'm creative and I know how to think outside of the box when it counts and when it's needed.

“Guys!" I yell. They all look at me with frantic expressions on their faces, I could see the whites of their eyes like mirror images of cornered animals. “Listen up!" I shout, “Do not use magic, it makes this place turn into a feeding frenzy, use whatever else you can find and run for your lives!" They all grab things out of their bags, and I decide to use my weapon of choice, my body. We start wailing on these deformed gnarled creatures, some are made of wood, others are mud, and when I tell you we ran out of there by the skin of our feet, I mean we peg it as fast as we are able to go. I just hope Shadow is doing better than we are right at this moment, but we can't hold on to much hope there, I mean his dad is a demon afterall.