The trip started the way any school trip did—rowdy, loud, suffocating. The bus stank of cheap snacks, oily hair, and teenage hormones.
By the time they reached the planetarium, Sam was already zoning out. She didn't care for artificial stars projected on dome ceilings. She wanted the real thing, the dirt, the flowers, the danger.
The zoo, the museum, the adventure park—all checkmarks on the itinerary. None of it stirred Sam. But then came the nursery.
The bus veered off the highway, down a road that seemed less traveled, as if the world itself had forgotten it existed.
It was dusk when the bus came to a stop. The sky was swollen with bruised clouds, and the wind carried an unsettling scent—like flowers rotting inside glass jars.
"The bus can't go further. The path's too narrow," the teacher said. "Everyone out. We walk."
Sam stepped down onto the gravel. The road was flanked by tall rubber trees on the left, their glossy leaves clinging to shadows, while on the right, an ancient concrete wall loomed over them, its surface cracked like old skin.
It was then she saw him.
A man. Buzz cut. Mid-fifties. Standing motionless among the weeds.
His expression was blank, but his eyes... they weren't blank at all. They held something... too much of something. Too much of nothing.
"Sam," Wang whispered beside her. "You see that guy?"
She nodded, feeling a chill crawl up her spine. "Yeah. And I don't like the way he's looking at us."
They both tried to ignore him as the class marched forward. But Sam couldn't shake the feeling that the man wasn't watching them—he was studying them. Like a scientist observing test subjects. Or a predator sizing up prey.
The narrow path seemed to stretch endlessly, the trees whispering things in a language only Sam could almost—but not quite—understand.
And then... something odd. Sam glanced at the cracked wall. Symbols. Faded symbols. Circles, flowers, eyes.
She blinked, and they were gone.
"Did you... see those?" she asked Wang.
"See what?"
Sam swallowed the lump in her throat.
Maybe it was nothing.
Maybe.