Camp Pine Cove

Baba

Winn stood in the bathroom of her cabin. It was 8:55 and there was a staff meeting in 5 minutes, she was relaxed as Nikki was putting the campers to bed. She unwrapped the bandages around her arms to change them, unrolling new bandages when she heard footsteps, and a voice behind her. "Winn?" She turned around surprised "Nikki!" the girl looked her up and down, her eyes training on her arms. "You uh, you didn't fall off a ladder did you?" Winn sighed "You caught me" Nikki set her glass down and walked over, she held Winn's hand gently and studied the marks and crude Symbols. Some of the cuts were fresh and still bleeding. "Winn" Winn pulled her hand away "You should go to bed Nikki" the younger girl held firm "Winn what happened?" Winn dried her hands scowling "Go to bed Nikki, I need you to watch the kids" Nikki didn't budge "Winn talk to me" She was having a hard time keeping it together "Go" "Talk" "You need to leave" "You need someone to talk to" Winn was getting angry "Why won't you listen to me? I don't want you to get hurt!" Nikki remained calm as Winn lost it. She'd bottled her emotions and fear into her head and she was breaking like a fallen glass. Nikki walked over to her as Winn shuddered stifling her crying. She wrapped her arms around her and held her. "It's ok Winn, even the best get hurt. You just need to talk to me" Winn sighed. "Later Nikki, now go to bed" The girl finally sighed "Promise?" Winn nodded "Promise".

Winn stood in a long corridor, it wasn't part of the longhouse or any part of camp, she looked around. "Hello?" her voice echoed bouncing off the walls and ceiling. A figure appeared at the end of the hall, she couldn't quite make them out but it started moving. Right at her. She turned heal and started running the opposite direction. Her ragged breaths pulsing in her ears as her shoes collided with concrete. She turned to see if the figure was still pursuing her but found no one. She turned back running right into them, into their knife that was now buried into her chest. She fell backwards hitting the ground with a thud. She stared at the ceiling twitching, the figure loomed over her grinning. "See you soon Winn"

Winn shot forward stifling a scream. The only sounds in her cabin was the slight breeze through the windows, and light snoring of her kids.

Winn sipped her coffee staring at the schedule on her phone, Evan read the paper while Angie and Stephen argued over which avenger was the best. Q and Sammie were nowhere to be found,and it was making Winn nervous. Just as she was starting to stand to check up on them the doors flew open and they ran in with their kids yelling "FOOD FIGHT" lobbing a pie at Winns face. Her head flew backwards as the perfectly good key lime pie fell landing face down on the ground. She opened her eyes and sighed "You brought this on yourselves. Purple cabin!" He kids looked up at her waiting "To arms!" They all screeched with joy sending a volley of breakfast upon the two counselors at the door. It was enough to knock Sammie backwards and Q off their feet, Winn had time to fistpump when a pancake collided with her shirt. She looked around eyes locking on Angie and frowned. "Alright Emmerson, you're on" The dining hall descended into chaos.

Winn gave a sheepish smile to a distressed Leona as the Purple cabin escaped the warzone to their first rotation. Thankfully it was canoeing and they were able to take a dip in the lake to get the syrup out of their hair. Winn laughed as Josh sighed walking by trying not to get his tablet wet from the kids playing in the water, Winn left Nikki in charge as she ducked into the bathrooms to change out the now soaked bandages for new ones. She pulled out the roll and almost shrieked when her arms started glowing. Not the regular kind of glowing, more like the sun was trapped under her skin and was leaking out of the cuts in her arms. She moved her hand to touch it when she heard Nikki scream outside. The glowing stopped as her head jerked up and she ran throwing the door open, almost tripping on her shoes.

Winn almost ate shit into the dirt when she saw what lay ahead of her. A bear, no. Bigfoot? No. Baba. He reared up on his legs, face opening like a flower revealing a spiraling set of teeth. He held Q in his grasp their legs kicking as they clutched onto his arm to prevent him from tearing their collar. "Winn! Sammie! Help!" Sammie ran out of the woods, Win looked around. The only kids who seemed to be reacting were the heads of cabins. The teens looked at each other in fear, some taking up branches or clutching stones frozen. The rest of the kids may have glanced over lazily but seemed too distracted with whatever activity they were engaged in. Sammie flew out of the woods, she wore a bandolier of sorts, a tactical sash securing a machete and different cuts of meat? Winn ran forward and spread her arms backing the kids up. "Don't even think about it! Keep your cabins safe! Go!" She turned watching Sammie work a sort of magic. "Baba! Come on boy! Come here! Come get the deer flank!" Sammie caught his attention as he dropped Q. They hit the grass with a soft thud and Sammie breathed a sigh of relief. Angie came racing with a javelin in hand, Winn had no clue where she got it but it made her feel safer already. Sammie ran back into the woods Baba lumbering after her. Angie looked at Winn making a face along the lines of What the hell just happened and walked back to the longhouse. Q dusted themself off and shook their head "I'm going to kill Sammie, she did not tell me she was going Baba hunting.
Winn sighed "We have a bigger problem" She pointed at the heads of the cabins staring in shock, jaws practically on the ground and wonder in their eyes. "Winn?" Nikki took a step forward. "Pardon my language" she cleared her throat and brought her hands together, letting them fall forward. "But what the fuck"

Counselors stared at their kids seated in the long house, kids talking amongst themselves as did their caretakers. "What do you mean they saw everything?" Chris hissed trying to give a reassuring smile. Winn chewed her nail, a habit she had when she as nervous. "I mean, these kids saw everything, they described it to me, and they were ready to fight Chris. What do we do?" before he could answer the door was thrown open. Sammie stood in the entrance shirt torn and pants covered in mud. Dark stains soaked her clothes and Winn was just hoping it wasn't what she thought it was. "Sammie!" A brunette girl sprinted from one of the arm chairs and tackled her in a hug. Sammie looked surprised, "Uh, hey Katie" The girl stepped back anger flaring in her eyes. "I thought you were dead! What the hell Sammie what was I going to do without you?" Sammie's eyes shone with emotion, and also tears. "You would've been fine. Plus I'm not going anywhere." She looked up. Katie hovering close but in more of a protective manner. "What'd I miss?" Josh was infuriated "Sammie Padia what the hell was going through your head going after that! That thing!" Sammie stepped back at the shouting "woah hold on a second! You don't know the whole story. I was walking through the forest with my kids for horseback riding and Baba snatched Q, he was bored cause I hadn't come visit him and wanted attention. That's all!" Josh threw his hands up "No that's not all! What do we tell these kids parents now that they've seen it?"

"do you mind if I interject here?" All heads turned to a short curly haired kid in the corner. "Hi I'm Parson, I'm head of yellow cabin" some kids waved sarcastically, they were obviously friends. "I just wanted to say, and I think most of us agree that this doesn't really discourage us? Obviously yeah it's dangerous but we're also the ones who've been here the longest and you seem to trust us enough to put us in charge. We're here all summer, as long as no one else gets hurt, We'll be just fine." Winn looked around, the rest of the kids shrugged and nodded. A dark skinned girl who Winn believed was named Freddie spoke up. "Honestly it's pretty cool we have our own cryptid" Katie frowned "Speak for yourself, that thing is just a hairy Demogorgon." that got a chuckle. Josh rubbed the back of his neck and eyed Chris who smiled and spread his arms wide. "Well if you say so! The more the merrier I'd say". Winn frowned but looked around at everyone who seemed to be in agreement. Would this be a bad time to bring up the fact that without caution she's now physically scarred for the rest of her life?