The stars here didn’t twinkle, they burned.
Sharp, cold, and watchful, like the sky itself was keeping tabs on me. Wonderland’s version of a ceiling didn’t bring peace. It felt like judgment. Like every star was a memory waiting to catch fire.
I laid flat in the grass, arms behind my head, trying to breathe through the weight of everything. The camp was finally quiet. Everyone was sleeping.
Except me. Of course.
I didn’t even hear her coming. Not until the grass shifted beside me, slow and careful. She didn’t ask if she could lay down. She didn’t need to. Cindy just lowered herself beside me, silent as a prayer, eyes fixed upward.
For a while, neither of us said a word.
It wasn’t awkward, it was necessary.
Eventually, she whispered, “I thought if I just closed my eyes hard enough… the dreams would stop. I tried what you told me but…”
I glanced over. She looked like a ghost in the starlight. Hollow-eyed. Haunted. Beautiful in a way broken things are beautiful when they keep holding on.
“Didn’t work?” I asked, voice low.
She shook her head. “Same nightmare. Same screams. Same cold hands. She’s always there.”
I let the silence sit for a moment before answering. “You ever wonder if the dead stay close because we won’t let go… or because they can’t?”
Cindy didn’t answer right away. Her throat worked like she was swallowing glass.
Then: “Sometimes I don’t know which hurts worse, remembering her or the fear that I’ll forget her.”
I turned my head, watching her. She wasn't crying, but her eyes were full of something deeper than tears. That kind of ache that rots beneath the ribs and doesn’t make a sound.
So I did what I always do when words won’t fix a damn thing.
I reached.
Not with my hands. But with memory.
“You remember the pit?” I said.
That pulled a sound from her, half laugh, half breath. “Yeah. How could I forget? It was cold as hell. No comfort, just the light of the stars above just beyond the cell doors.oh, and you kept talkin’ to shadows like they were people.”
“They were people,” I murmured, full of humor. “Forgotten ones. Just like us. I figured if I talked loud enough, the walls might remember we were still alive and hold up.”
Cindy turned her face toward me, eyes softening. “You crazy.”
“Crazy or intriguing?”
She smiled, shaking her head. Not the big kind, just a flicker. A fragile, crooked little thing. And it lit her up in a way nothing else had all night.
“You ever think we made it out just to end up back in a different kind of cage?” she asked.
I blinked at the stars. “Yeah. But this one’s got grass. And air. And a comfortable bed.”
Cindy didn’t answer, but I felt her shift closer. Close enough her arm brushed mine. Close enough the heat of her breath ghosted across my shoulder.
“The stars here,” she said quietly, “so surreal you know.”
“I still can’t figure out what they are.”
“You working that out too huh?”
I didn’t answer. Just laid there in the hum of silence, beside the only person who knew what it meant to survive the pit and still have shadows crawling up your spine at night.
We both looked up.
The sky wasn’t just full of stars, it was moving. Slow spirals of light twisting like paint in water. A galaxy melting. A dream unraveling.
“It’s beautiful,” she breathed.
“Yeah.”
She turned her head toward me, and for the first time all night, our eyes met.
“What if we never get peace?” she asked.
I swallowed hard. “Then we make our own. Even if it’s just watching the night sky like this.”
Cindy blinked slow. “You scare me when you talk like that.”
“Why?”
“Because it makes me feel so uncertain.”
“Life is uncertain, we just have to roll with the punches and do what we can as we go along.”
She didn’t say much after that.
Didn’t have to.
She just exhaled, slow and long, then shifted again, head gently falling against my shoulder. I felt it, the weight of her finally letting go. Not all the way. Just enough to rest.
I didn’t move.
Didn’t breathe too deep.
Didn’t even blink for a minute.
Her hair brushed my jaw, soft like grass, and she smelled like lavender and smoke, like something beautiful that refused to burn all the way down.
She was asleep within minutes.
Her body leaned into mine like it trusted me to stay.
And I did.
I sat still, listening to her breathing even out, heart slower now. Calmer.
Peace.
The sky was pale when I finally blinked.
The stars had tucked themselves away, and the weird violet hue of Wonderland morning was creeping in slow. My neck was stiff, my back sore as hell, but I didn’t move, not yet. Not when Cindy was still curled up against me, her breath soft against my neck. One arm had found its way across my chest sometime in the night, and her hand was half-curled in the fabric like she’d been holding onto something in a dream.
I didn’t wanna wake her.
But of course, peace never lasted long around here.
Footsteps.
Lazy, crunching grass, way too casual to be anyone but,
“Well damn... ain't this sweet.”15Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQQhQrSBzZd
Nyx.
I didn’t even have to look up to know he was grinning.I heard it in his damn voice.
“Should I come back later? Or y’all still cuddled up in trauma recovery mode?”
I exhaled, slow, refusing to move. “Don’t you got somewhere else to be?”
“Not anymore. This right here?” I could practically hear the smirk deepen. “This my whole morning now.”
Cindy stirred a little, eyelids twitching like she was waking up, and I shot Nyx a glare sharp enough to cut steel. “She had a hard time sleeping moron. If you wake her, I will kill you personally.”
He lifted his hands like I’d just pulled a weapon. “Aight, damn. Just sayin’... next time y’all wanna have a midnight grass date, maybe hang a sign or somethin’. I got trauma too, you know. Can’t be walkin’ up on this without warning.”
I rolled my eyes, but the corner of my mouth twitched. Bastard.
“Get outta here, Nyx.”
“Cool, cool,” he said, backing up with both hands still raised, but that grin didn’t leave his face. “Y’all cute though. Real cute. Like little field mice or somethin’.”
I felt her shift beside me, soft and slow, like she was tryin’ not to let the world know she’d been comfortable. Her head was still on my shoulder, hell, she probably forgot, and then boom, realization hit her like thunder.
She jolted up, brushing herself off like she just got caught skipping church.
“And she wakes yall the princess herself after a little midnight cuddle session.”
Cindy spun around, eyes wide. “Nyx?! ”
He grinned so hard I thought his face might crack. “Too late, don't get shamed now. Look at y’all, grass in your hair, starry-eyed and whatnot. This is so sweet, I’m gettin’ a cavity.”
“Boy,” she warned, pointing at him. “Don’t play with me.”
“Oh, relax. I’m just sayin’, it’s a new look for you. Soft. Peaceful. Like you weren’t just snorin’ in Crypt’s neck.”
“I don’t snore!”
“You did a little baby snort,” I added, just to make it worse.
Cindy whipped her head toward me, betrayal written all over her face. “I knew I couldn’t trust you.”
Nyx held his stomach laughing. “This made my whole morning. I don’t even need breakfast.”
“I hope you choke on it,” Cindy mumbled, trying to fix her hair and dignity at the same time. But her cheeks were pink, and even though she tried to act mad, I caught that little smile creeping in.
As Nyx wandered off, still chuckling to himself, she shook her head. “Why does he always pop up at the worst times?”
“’Cause God knew we needed someone to clown us back to reality.”
She looked at me, softer now, like the walls came back down. She hit me softly on the chest. Saying with a smile in her voice “ Boy you crazy.”
I shrugged trying to figure out why it seemed as though this was so casual to her.I kind of expected a crazier reaction. But instead she acted as if she should be here like this, and that this was just…… normal. Does she not realize I’m a zombie? Did she forget who I really was? Had I changed that much? “Cindy?.”
“Yeah?”
I couldn’t quite get the words formulated right. I wanted to ask her a question, but every way I thought of it sounded not like myself I guess. So I just asked a simpler one
“Feel better?”
She smirked. “Mhmm.You lucky I didn’t drool.”
“Oh, you did. Just a little.”
She hit me softly again before finally getting up and walking off to wash up.
As soon as the crumbs were eaten, it was off to work.
Aya got to drawing again, her sketches carved straight into the dirt like blueprints. She had this whole layout already brewing in her head. Training quarters, a lookout perch, even a secret tunnel hidden by the root systems. Girl thought of everything.
“Make sure the tunnel bends,” she said, voice sharp as chalk. “If it’s straight, someone could hit us with a blast straight through.”
“Good call,” I nodded. “Make it a maze.”
Nyx stood on a half-finished beam with his hands on his hips like he was modeling. “Y’all see me up here riskin’ my life for some base then yall wanna talk about tunnels? Y'all don’t care about me?”
“Hey Nyx, fall,” I told him. “I dare you.”
He smirked, but he kept working.
Cindy, meanwhile, had found her flow. She talked to the earth like it was an old friend,practicing on her nature abilities. She was getting the hang of it even though I know it scared her to use it. Coaxing thick ivy and wood into reinforcement made things easier. Vines wrapped tight around the wall frames, knotting themselves into something damn near impenetrable. A living wall. Defensive. Flexible. Beautiful.
I watched her for a second, her fingers tracing bark like she was braiding it. Calm, but focused. And yet, you could still see it in her eyes, somewhere far off, she was still wrestling ghosts. My advice didn’t fix everything. But maybe... it helped.
“You sure it can hold weight?” I asked, coming up beside her.
She didn’t look at me. Just whispered something low to the ivy, then turned.
“Try breakin’ it.”
I grinned. “That a challenge?”
“That’s a warning.”
I liked that.
We moved like that for hours. Small crew, tighter bond. Aya handled the layout and enchantments. Nyx set up traps and flame sigils to light up the ground if intruders crossed. Cindy strengthened the whole frame with natural reinforcements. And me? I kept the shape of it all, laid the foundation stones, carved symbols into the main floor. Not spells, just reminders. Words that meant something:
Freedom. Family. Fire.
By dusk, sweat soaked our shirts, nails were broken, fingers were blistered, and we had the first two walls up. Still open-air, but the shape was there. The bones of it. One more wall and a roof, and this place could actually hold.
“Not bad for a bunch of storybook dropouts,” Nyx said, sitting on a pile of bark.
Cindy popped a berry in her mouth and shot him a look. “Who you callin’ a dropout? I was valedictorian boy gimme my flowers.”
“In what, cryptic love’?”
She just smiled and raised her hand, a single vine slapping him lightly across the head.
He laughed. “Alright, alright, I take it back.”
Aya fell onto the grass, arms splayed. “We still gotta name it,” she mumbled through her own exhaustion. “Feels wrong not to.”
I sat down beside her, wiping my face with a dirty rag. I looked up at what we’d made. Rough. Unfinished. But strong.
By the time we nailed the last plank and the roof was sealed tight, dusk had turned to dead night. The sky above was still painted in that unnatural Wonderland twilight, soft purples, green glows, drifting jellyfish-like clouds that pulsed slow as heartbeats. Felt like the world itself was watching us work.
But the base?
It was done.
Four walls. Reinforced. Hidden by thick vines and twisted roots, and masked by Aya’s illusions. From the outside, it looked like a crumbling part of the forest. But inside? This was ours.
Floor was stone and moss, cold and grounded. A center fire pit. Hidden shelves carved into the walls.Our own separate rooms. One ladder leading up to a lookout post covered in flowering mushrooms that Aya swore could scream if stepped on.
Nyx flopped into a hammock he'd tied between two posts. “This? This is luxury. Somebody bring me a damn smoothie.”
“No electricity, fool,” Cindy said, walking past him with a bundle of branches balanced on one arm. “Grind your own fruit.”
“I’ll remember that next time I gotta save your life.”
“You didn’t save nothin’ but your ego,” she tossed back.
He gave her a mock salute.
We could’ve rested. Should’ve, probably. But when you’ve got fire under your ribs, rest feels like rust.
So we split up and got to work on the entrances, places we knew Wonderland would try to use to worm back into our lives. Holes in the forest. Broken mirrors. Twisted doorways. There were five we could find, all pulsing with that humming energy.
I carved war runes around the first one with a jagged rock, each one a ward. Nyx laced the dirt with fire-etched traps, runes that’d combust if someone even breathed the wrong way near them.
But Aya, it was creepy to say the least?
“Rise,” she whispered, crouching low to the mushroom beds near one of the forest’s warped trees. “Guard what’s ours.”
And they moved. They moved.
Mushroom people, tall, squat, armored in bark and fungus, rose from the ground like soldiers growing from the soil. Teacup beasts, those creepy little buggers with eyes in the porcelain and legs like crickets, hopped forward and lined up, waiting for her command.
She stood, her wild hair catching the wind, arms glowing faint with that fey-like magic she barely even understood yet. “Anything not us, crush it. Burn it. Snap it in half.”
One of the teacups chirped. She nodded like it was language.
I watched her from a distance. Yup as you guessed, somehow creeped out by it all. Not that I was one to speak but…And maybe that’s what scared me the most. Not her power, but how creepy it looked on her.
Cindy planted seeds at every gate. They bloomed instantly, bladed vines, snapping buds, even a flower that spit venom if the wrong aura came near. She called it “Kiss from Mama.” Real sweet name, until it tried to bite my boot off.
“Don’t step there,” she warned casually, tugging the vine back into line. “She got trust issues.”
“Clearly.”
By the time we met back at the base, the moon was spinning sideways in the sky and the wind smelled like peppermint and ink. Nothing here made sense. We decided to rest for the night because tomorrow, our conquest would begin.
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