File 7.643-Vibe Town {dropped}

Chapter 3: The Betweenlands

We stood there, shivering, and slowly, the door creaked open. An old lady stood there, hunched over. Her white hair was jagged and thin, and her eyes had only a dim light in them with a hint of green. An old toad croaked in her apron pocket. "Yes?", she said slowly.

"We were just exploring and stumbled across your cabin," Milo said bravely.  The old woman spotted the wands in our pockets.

"You don't belong here." She said. "We call this place the Betweenlands. Our vibe counter has been standing still at 0 since 2020 now, wouldn't be surprised if it stayed like that forever. You kids care about the vibes and money and all that stuff."

"2020!" I gasped, then quickly covered my mouth. "You-you're that old!"

The woman nodded. "Would you like to hear about back then? Please, come in." She opened the door wider and revealed someone else standing there. It was another old woman who seemed to be as old as the first. She had thick brown hair down to her thighs and the same dim light in her eyes.

Milo and I sat down on a green couch, careful not to squish the almost neon blue lizard that was next to us.

Across from us, the woman with the apron sat down. "My name is Inga Buggington and this is Carla Bwomp." "I'm Sam, and this is Milo. Oh, the fox is Juniper and the snake is Chamomile." Inga pointed to her toad. "This is Snella. Oh, and the lizard is Ivy. Don't sit on her," she said. The lizard licked its eyes and blinked dumbly.

"Anyways, I remember when we came to Vibetown all those years ago. It was nothing like what you see today, still a work in progress. Those vibe hunters or whatever they're called are terrifying. They're new. Vibes used to just be for fun, but these days they're everything," she says.

Carla pipes up, "They're the ones that put us here, in the Betweenlands. Our vibes were at 0 and they didn't know what to do. We weren't in debt or anything because the vibes were optional. We just didn't really... socialize, y' know."

"The good thing is, no one ever comes down here to tell us anything, so we just stay here with the mutated pets. Those pets are from the people who went to Bad Vibes town, and they just wander around in this radioactive place." Inga adds.

Carla goes into the kitchen and returns with a strange stew that smelled like vegetables.

"So, where do you get the supplies for food if you don't have vibes to buy anything with?" I ask. Carla shakes her head.

"Kids these days...", she says disapprovingly," We make it ourselves! If you would like to see the garden, go ahead." Carla motions out to the back of the house. We head outside.

"Look, potatoes!", Milo says. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a two-headed crocodile around 5 feet tall slowly slithers down from a tree. Milo cursed us! Carla and Inga look calm, but the croc doesn't. Milo and I flee inside, but the crocodile snaps at Carla and grabs her leg. A trail of blood spurts out as it gets torn off. A sharp scream from Carla finishes her off and her eyes go white and roll into her head. Our eyes almost did the same as we watched the gruesome scene. What we hadn't noticed was Inga getting torn to pieces by the other head. We couldn't look away from their limp bodies as the crocodile devoured them, we seemed almost in a trance.

As fast as we can, Milo and I bolt away from the house, leaving the toad and lizard to fend for themselves. "Milo, this is all your fault!", I say, still shaking. "I- Well, at least we aren't dead." He starts slowing his pace, and we make it back to the Vibey Inn, huffing to catch our breath. "Well, if that's the Betweenlands, who knows what the Bad Vibes Town is like." He says.

We walk inside the inn and part ways. "Well, I'll see you tomorrow, maybe. I'm definitely going to do something more relaxing." I say, turning around and walking towards my room. Juniper is shaking. I flop down on my bed feeling my muscles relax and drift off.

The announcement wakes me up from my slumber. I rub my eyes, still drowsy from running from the crocodile. I think I've had my share of exploring for a while.

I walk into the kitchen and open the mini-fridge. There are frozen waffles inside, so I warm a few up. They pop out the toaster and I throw one at Juniper who catches it, well, almost catches it. As I eat, I stare out of the window, thinking about this strange paradise. Is it really a paradise if you can die so easily? If everything your life depends on is... vibes? I get snapped out of my trance by a knock- probably Milo, I think and go to open the door.

However, it's a girl that stands there at the door. I've seen her before- the girl who sat by Milo at the Diner the first day I came. She has a possum hanging from her arm. Her eyes are baby blue, along with her shirt. She has a silver nose ring and several ear piercings. Her hair is a beautiful glistening black, and it flows down slightly past her shoulders. She looks over me like she expected something more.

"You must be... Sam." She says. She sounds like the popular cheerleader in those stereotypical highschool movies. I don't like her, but I pretend to be nice.

"Well, yeah, that's me. Wait, how do you know that?"

She sighs. "Milo told me about you. You're supposedly really interesting? Is that like, you?" Why would Milo be talking to her?, I think.

"Uh, yeah I guess. How did you and Milo meet?", I say.

"We're like, siblings." I noticed her pitch-black hair and her framed eyes. "Oh yea, I guess you do look like him. So did you come to the town at the same time? Like, did you both appear in the greenhouse together?" Now I am intrigued. I remember my little sister. Sarah, was it? Something like that.

"I mean, yeah," she says. Oh no. If Sarah's not here... where is she? A sickening feeling washed over me. The girl looks at me strangely. My face must reveal what I'm thinking.

"Uh, I gotta go.", I close the door. I hear her scoff and her clicky heels walking away.

I realize- I never got her name. Maybe when I recollect my thoughts about Sarah, I'll go and find her again. Sarah? Yeah, Sarah.