INTO THE WOODS (Masky x reader x Hoodie)

CHAPTER 29

She gulped, beginning to back up into the woods. The one with the black hoodie glanced up, face hidden by the bandanna he wore. He made a grunting sound, tilting his head. The blond looked over to him, grunting. What were they doing? Were they trying to talk to each other? Why couldn't they talk?
They went silent again, but the silence and the complete stillness was near unbearable as she stayed still. She felt her legs quake in pure anxiety, she felt like they knew exactly where she was.
After several minutes of complete silence and stillness, the black hoodie shook his head, pushing his attention back to the fire he was tending. The blond grunted, beginning to stare into the fire. The stubby one sat, legs barely crossed as he was unreadable.
She began to crawl very slowly, desperately trying to avoid all the sticks under her palms. She didn't dare observe them anymore, the feeling of watching them created the fear of them standing up and looking her directly in her eyes.
It was then when she felt something bite down into her leg. She instantly shot her hand to her mouth, muffling the sounds of her pain. It bit down harder with each passing second. Stupidly, she sharply drew her her leg back, causing what felt like a chunk of her skin rip apart. She got a hold of what had just bitten her.
From the very dim lighting of the fire, she grabbed something with incredibly oily scales. Wow- what convenience! Right after she was warned, some douchebag little snake takes a chunk of her leg? What fucking luck.
She began to kick away from it, instantly drawing her hands back. She felt someone grab the back of her arms and drag her up, and she began to violently struggle.
"I told you we were being followed," the short and stubby man grumbled from behind his mask.
"So the rumors are true," the one in the black hoodie said, chuckling. "It's that bitch."
"What, thought we couldn't talk?" It was then when she realized that she was lifted almost effortlessly out of the air, she watched her legs dangle and drip with crimson.
"N-n-no, I-I-"
"Look, it talks," The red bandanna laughed.
She looked up, a pair of cold, brown eyes stared down into the depths of her soul as she felt everything become light.
"The man holding you is Terron. Terron had a three year old daughter. He doesn't talk, because, well..." the short one tilted his head, his fat neck rolling. "You can show them, can't you?" He asked.
The man who's bandanna covered his face nodded without any emotion. He look down at the girl, as he began to slowly tear off the bandanna.
Her jaw dropped as she stayed silent, unable to give words for the horror she was faced with. His skin looked like it had melted at his lips, his nose as completely bashed in, there was a deep whole in his left cheek with crusted blood and vomit at the sides of it. The crusted tissue of the residue of his skin scattered his face like blood after a shooting- well- he was the blood after the shooting. Blood oozed from his mouth, as it was apparent he could no longer speak.
"Like what you see?" He asked. "Because I do, and unlike last time, it's completely up for grabs. Literally." Bones declared, getting intimidatingly close to her face. His eyes bulged his grey colour, blood specs all around his face. "Your little boyfriends got me straight in the chest. Ever got your heart broken? Well, it's like that, but a thousand times worse," his dark brown eyes were a dark red around his iris. She felt fear gurgle in the bottom of her stomach as she stumbled on her words, unable to comprehend the situation at hand.

These people- the deaths they went through- she had some connection to them, all. She felt guilt squeeze through her arms as she felt herself becoming more and more numb body wise. It was like she couldn't build up any amount of fear to start running.
"So, since, I believe, we are the first to really get you in this shit hole, let's see just about how strong you are!" The short one laughed in a maniacal fashion, now cracking his knuckles while walking closer to her. "You see where I got stabbed?" He asked, lifting up his shirt- a whole gushed dry blood from a wound that seemed like it had been rotting for months. "Let's see how you like it."

She shook her head no, jaw trembling as she began to kick away. Something in her throat caught all of her words and sent them back, disabling her speech, silencing her cries. The grip on her arms became loose as she was dropped, "Terron" backing away. Confused, the men began to question him, and she took her chance. She got onto her feet and booked it, no trails guiding her, having to dodge every tree that came her way. She heard yelling not too far behind her, but they were damned to think that any of that was going to stop her.

After what felt like hours of endless running, her knees gave out, her legs burned and so did her throat. She fell by a small creak, smelling like piss and blood, and vomit. Disgusted with herself, covered in a cold sweat, she inched to the water. She dipped a single finger in, testing the waters, literally; ice cold. It felt like magic against her body. Even though the forest felt like it was in a freezer, the water was a change in temperature to her body at the moment. She cupped the water and splashed her face, shaking her head. She had to keep going.. what would happen if she just fell asleep? She was so tired.. she'd seen terrors like no other without even being in this damned place for over three hours. Actually, she didn't even recall how long she'd been here. Who knew if time even existed here? She did need the rest.
She began to walk again, much more calming then all the running she'd done. She could see the moon now, the only light shimmering was from the old rock.
She found a small cabin, conveniently enough, although it was old, falling apart and dark.. it would work. For now, she decided, until she got the fuck out of here. Which she would. She wasn't going to lose hope anytime soon, especially not now.
She stealthily made her way into the single room cabin, catching the glimpse of an orange candle in her peripheral. Turning her eye, it was a candle- but not exactly. It was battery powered, which surprised her. Walking over to it, she picked it up. It made a decent amount of light for such a small thing.
She walked over, eyeing a small mattress with sheets draped over it lazily. A pair of dirt covered boots laid next to it.
She began to contemplate. All of this seemed ultra convenient- wasn't this supposed to be some sort of hell, or something? What was this cabin even doing here? Who's shoes were those?
She began to scan the cabin further to try and get a better understanding of who roamed there. Walking over to the desk, she found scrap paper which was fading yellow, from what she hoped was time. Opening up one of the drawers, she found a notebook. It was a yellow composition notebook, and when she skimmed through the papers, she found something that surprised her. In this notebook was not a language she could understand. One with characters that she'd never seen before, all so neatly written in a black, ink pen. Amazement washed over her when she inspected the letters further. They all started on the left side of the page. From her understanding, only certain languages start from the left side, such as Arabic- and she was sure this wasn't Arabic. It had the twists and turns of what some people might connect to Asian languages, but it was none that she could recall. None that she'd ever seen before. She traced the letters over with her fingers, the oddly small book filled with such intelligent looking letters felt smooth, and cold. She pushed the little notebook inside of her leather jacket, and went on scanning.
She found nothing odd, which she was dumbfounded by; everything seemed normal, except the little notebook. She went to walk around in circles, highly irritated. There had to be something!
As she walked, only one squeak went under her feet; after two minutes of walking, she stopped in the spot. She started to bounce on the spot, hating the sound, but an idea popped into her head. She examined the floorboards, then realized that the one piece of wood was different from the others. Her hands began to pick up the board; it was pitch black underneath. Grabbing the battery powered candle, she was able to see a small box in the corner of the hidden area. Grabbing it, she set down the candle and found that to her dismay, it was locked.
Cursing to herself, she tried the default lock; 0000. Nothing.
"Fucking hell, of coarse," she muttered. Feeling defeated, she sat back and sighed. Tilting her head to the side, she picked up the 6 inch long, 4 inch wide, light green, faded, wooden box and shook it. She head little objects and what she thought was a metal object shake around and hit each other.
Another bright idea popped into the girl's head.

"Why try and find the code?.. it's wooden, so, let's just pound this shit."
And that is the very best common sense 99.9% of characters in these books lack. Good one!