As I looked at him, the leader of the group glared at me, he had a look like a goth shaggy Rodgers, very lanky, a soul patch, baggy clothes.

  "Don't say that word." He said to me, his face serious as can be, "They can hear you."

  "Who?" I was confused for half a second but then I got it, he saw the comprehension on my face and rolled his eyes, "Yea, THEM, Don't speak the name, don't ask anyone about it, do not let them know youre looking for them, or THEY will find you."

  I chuckled, "Funny, that's exactly what we want."

  He sighed and the girl of the group patted his back, "No...I promise you, you dont."

  Edge sat up in his seat, "And how would you know about this?"

  The boy gestured to all of us, "Not here...meet us by the football field after school."

  And like that, they were gone.

  We all high-fived, it was our first lead of the mission and it only took half a day.

  They wouldn't all be this easy.

  After school we met the other students by the football field, they were all waiting for us.

  Introductions were not lengthy, but I'm gonna write it all down anyway, because like I said at the beginning, we're doing facts.

  There was Hunter, who seemed to be their de facto leader. Once again, goth shaggy.

  There was Robyn, a very pretty but naturally lean emo girl, petite in frame but tall, willowy I suppose would be the word.

  There was Charley, wore the dark clothes attributed to the group's aesthetic, but had a head full of blonde curls and bright blue eyes, he was an artist and drew the things they had seen in the town for our benefit, trying to explain stuff to us.

  Then there was the party of the 4th part.

  He didn't give us his name, I mostly just called him fedora kid in my head because of his choice of headwear (a plaid fedora). He was as lanky as Hunter but not as tall, he had badly dyed black hair and obviously was obsessed with Robyn, but she was dating Hunter and the fact party 4th was obviously head over heels for Robyn often sparked arguments between the 3, leaving Charley the odd man out.

  (Merely an observation, this was not discussed with us during the introduction)

  After they had introduced themselves and told us what theyre all about, they spoke to me of encounters with The Entity (name changed for licensing reasons, apparently because of a certain movie he's copyrighted), Vampires, werewolves and zombies.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  "Ok, no."

  Edge immediately called BS, their first contribution to our discussion had surely exposed them, right? A tell that could not be denied, The Entity has never been real, its a bunch of stories on the internet.

  But as he spoke thusly, Robynn pulled up one of her sleeves to reveal a massive and extensive burn scar, segmented like the exoskeleton of a centipede but without legs, it snaked its way from her wrist all the way up her forearm, coiling around her arm above her elbow, tapering to a sharp tip, everyone stared in horror, aghast at this Greivous injury.

  "He did this to me." She said in a deadpan voice, looking Edge in the eyes as Hunter grabbed her other hand in a comforting motion, I didn't know what to say.

  She went on to describe her being cornered in her backyard by this creature, it had grasped her arm, and the appendage seared this scar into her arm before it vanished.

  "He marked her, for what reason...isn't exactly clear...We know you're not normal kids, nobody comes into this town knowing about the Shadowyn...you were sent here, weren't you? Sent to help us?" He looked increasingly desperate, his movements became increasingly erratic as what must have been years of desperation surfaced in a few seconds, "They've taken women and kids from the people of this town, OUR families, we've been fighting for our lives out here, all under their radar!"

  He grabbed me by the front of my shirt, a wild look in his eyes, "Tell me you're here to help us!"

  We looked at one another, Wolf shook her head, but then I turned back to the locals, "We're here to deal with them...we've trained for this."

  Edge growled and got in my face, "Green I swear to god...you probably just compromised the mission!"

  Hunter held up his hands, "hey! Hey! Chill!" I pushed Edge away and gestured to them, "Their childhoods have been robbed by a secret group, JUST like us, we can help them!"

  Wolf grabbed me by the ear, "We could get them KILLED, Green!!"

  Party 4th interjected, "Hey we've been doing fine without you assholes!"

  I groan at Wolf, "They need our HELP!!"

  Love pushed us apart, determination in her eyes, "Stop it! we don't have time for this, they need help, we can help them!"

  I look at Hunter and the others as I hug Love, "Do you know where we can start looking?"

  Hunter patted Charley's head, "He's working on pinpointing the Shadowyn's actual base of operations, for now, we have places we need to take you, to show you what the Shadowyn are doing to our town."

  Edge nods and pulls out his cellphone, "give us addresses and we'll-" he's cut off by a stiff arm and a grin from Hunter, "No, no, no Blaine, my town, my knowhow, MY mission."

  Edge swells up, "look-"

  Hunter booms out in a shocking display of vocal force, "No YOU look, do you know anything about Mr. Teeth?"

  Edge blinks, "Huh??"

  Hunter smirked and continued, "What about the rules of the Lizard Bridge?"

  Edge's face fell into a scowl, "What the fuck is the Lizard bridge!?"

  Hunter was grinning triumphantly now, "Thought so, what about the after-dark rules?"

  Edge didn't even respond to this, he sighed and put his phone away.

  Hunter spread his arms in a direct challenge, backing away, "If you think you can find these places by yourself, then you don't even need us."

  Edge looked angrily at us, a glance over at Wolf showed me she was just as disgruntled. This would be an easy fix for our problem, a day one lead, skipping the line of combing the town for clues, but the breach in the silence protocol meant that if news of this reached Sharp's ears then there'd be more than hell to pay.

  A price I was willing to pay immediately, their scars were proof enough of their conviction.

  Finally Wolf nodded and shook Hunter's hand, "you have a deal, but before we get into the tour, we need our weapons and equipment, can you take us to our house? Do you have any transportation?"

  Hunter walked us behind the football barracks to show us his large black van.

  "This was my dad's bus before he got got, it does its job."

  It was pretty spacious and had plenty of seating, we all got in and he started up the GPS to take us to our house.