Cryptid kings: a Hireath Attolia's rule AU

🕯🔦Discovery🤍🔮

Ravvanna woke from a nightmare that night, heart pounding in her chest, eyes wide with fear, it was the same nightmare that had plagued her for nights on end. It was always being chased by something, peculiar considering she wasn't afraid of being chased, but the fear in her nightmares always built like a tower.
     In the dreams she couldn't tell what the thing chasing her was. Not as if she didn't look over her shoulder she just simply couldn't see what the beast looked like, it was as if it was ever changing, morphing just before Ravvanna's brain could piece together the image before her.
    "Good lord," She muttered, scrambling for her phone in her bedsheets, everything felt less real here, the light catching on her dorm window felt fabricated, her tapestries stuttered against the wall as if they were glitching, but in retrospect it was probably just a track of the light.
    She went to the messages app, phone still trembling in her hands as she texted her best friend, Vy.
Hey dummy, You awake?
    She let her hope simmer, Vy had insomnia and he was a pretty terrible college student, since he never went to parties and mostly spent his time outside of school hanging out with his roommate and searching for cryptids. so there was a good chance he would have been awake at two am on a Tuesday night.
Always. What's up?
Rav felt her heart lift, just at the mere sight of Vy's text popping up on her tiny cracked phone screen.
Wanna go on a drive?
She laid back, letting her bright red hair hit the pillow. She knew he would say yes, he always did. And she knew she should be putting on clothes instead of pajamas.
omw, I'm gonna park near the woods because fuck your private school.
    Rav smiled at her phone screen and got to work putting on a garish layered green skirt that brushed her ankles and a cream colored sweater over her crochet cropped top she fell asleep in.

    In a few moments she snuck out of her dorm room and skittered down the emergency stairwell to the soft forest clearing, barely visible and soft edged against the dark. Everything was breathing and shifting out here, she felt the wind pull her skirt and watched it billow softly in the dim light, the air was crisp and fall scented and clear.
    "Faster asshole, it's kinda scary out here," She said softly, although she didn't actually mind waiting, it was scary, yes, but there was something oddly comforting about making up shapes curling in the trees and eyes peering at her from behind bushes. That was what she was looking for, right?

    She waited for a bit, listening to the soft billow of leaves against others and staring at her red fingers from beneath her scraggly fingerless gloves. Then Vy's forest green Porsche pulled up beside her, a car that was most definitely way too expensive for his budget and perfect for him since it was battered and scuffed and  personalized with tacky conspiracy theory-esque bumper stickers and cryptic paraphernalia that he most definitely got at rest stops and gas stations mostly directed toward tourists. "Get in dumbass we're driving to the forest," He said sweetly, leaning over to the open passenger side window.
    Rav flipped him off and got in the passenger seat, Vy had one hand resting idly on the wheel, the other was clutching his cellphone, his sweater was rolled down over his wrists and his long hair was tied into a scraggly ponytail at the back of his head, although it was only a year and a half difference he seemed a lot older than her. The fact that he acted like a dad didn't help.
    "You're dressed like a grandpa," She observed, snatching his round glasses off the dashboard.
    He made a swipe at her but his mismatched eyes were still on his phone screen. He was texting his roommate.
Just picked up Rav, you wanna come with us on a drive? She saw his hand flick over to the emoji keyboard and quickly retreat.
    He responded almost instantly, assuring Ravvanna that he, too, had been awake before she texted Vy, she could always count on these two insomniacs.
you know you could have asked me before you left right?
    Vy texted back a middle finger emoji.
mature. I'll come just let me get dressed. <3
Rav laughed and inclined her head on the headrest, she smelt the lingering smell of smoke and old coffee. Vy turned the car around and promptly sped out the school zone, with reckless abandon. She watched the passing trees, and tried to imagine the beasts lingering deep in the them, watching. "We're picking up the rest of the gang too, right?"       
    "Already texted them, they're already awake."
He drove to Westbrook Private School, an all boys prep school meant for people a lot more well off then her, it also just happened to be where her best friends, Shiloh and Leo schooled and lived.
Ravvanna slammed the car door, snatching her billowy skirt out of the way right before it snagged on the corner of the Porsche. The window was still rolled down slightly so that Vy could hear what she said, "I'll go get Shiloh and Leo, alright?"
He nodded, smoothing the soft fabric of his sweater, "you want me to wait outside the gates?"
Rav smiled sharply, a smile she slightly copied from Hugo, as known as, the worst person to ever take after,  "I'll be quick, can you be a good getaway driver?"
He grinned back at her, "I'm a shitty driver to begin with so why the hell not," She laughed, bumped fists with him and retreated to the back entrance of the dorm building.