The return of the dragon

My last night here

A loud car horn woke me up suddenly. It was so loud that in the same second I forgot the whole dream I was dreaming. Simon and Milo were standing in the doorway in front of my house, while Dante was sitting on the roof of his Jeep. I could almost see his proud smile, he was happy that he managed to traumatize us from the early morning. But, of course, he also woke up the whole neighborhood so his happiness did not last long as old Mr. Jones immediately got out and started an argument with him. This is not his first time arguing with the elderly, I am pretty sure that such discussions have already become a part of his personality. Dante will never stop behaving like a teenager. I will never forget when in high school he sprayed the entire opposing football team with fire extinguishing powder. He shouted all the time "It's snowing!" Fortunately, he was not expelled from school, but he had to sit in detention for about a month. Anyway, while he was arguing with a neighbor who persistently threatened to report him to the police, Simon and Milo went inside while my sleepy mother held the front door for them. "Good morning! I told him not to blow the horn." "Good morning, Milo." My mother spoke sleepily. "And I knew that he wouldn't listen to you and yes, good morning." "Good morning to you, too, Simon." "Are the princesses already awake?" Asked my father, who looked like he was going to go outside and support our dear neighbor who was still trying to give Dante a quick "How to behave yourself" course. "How could we not be awake after such a wonderful serenade!" I followed up on the conversation. "You're sure, Kristen doesn't look too awake." Simon added. "She looks more like a burrito in that blanket in wich she got out of your room." Milo was joking. "Yeah, she looks like a little burrito, who hasn't had her morning coffee yet, so we can tell she's not ready to socialize with us yet." I had to joke around a bit. "After all, how else should someone look when Dante woke her up at five in the morning?" "Speaking of Dante, I'm going to see how his diplomacy is going." My optician said as he put on his old shabby sneakers which he now already uses only for mowing the grass and, it seems, for emergencies like this. "Great, and you kids are slowly starting to get things out because Arabella will be furious if she has to wait too long for him." Said my mother who was pouring coffee for Kristen and herself along the way. "Really, how come you didn't pick her up first and how come she hasn't called yet to ask where you are?" I asked in astonishment. "Well, she would have killed Dante already, so we thought we'd give him a break. And, yes, she called already, but I told her we had some complications. And I sent her a picture of Dante arguing with a neighbor. She said she understood and would wait for us. " Simon informed us. "Great, you didn't let her kill him, so now I have to, wonderful." Kristen muttered, sipping her coffee. "So you don't want to go with Dante's car either, I guess Arabella doesn't want to either. You Eli? ” Suddenly Milo asked. "To be honest, I don't think I can sit in Dante's car without the whole neighborhood condemning me. So I'm going with you. " "Look at him. Why am I always the one who is forced to be with Dante? ” Simon asked jokingly, as Milo and I brought things from my room. "Because you love me, man. Good morning everyone!" Dante entered with a good mood. "Why are you so happy when my father got you out of trouble. Here, hold this! ” I tossed him a backpack. "Let's pack all our luggage in the car and go get Arabella." "Hello Dante, thank you for waking us up." My mother looked at him sternly, as he was already going outside. We quickly packed all our luggage in the car. Kristin is already laying in the back seat of Milo's car. Everyone settled in, while I stayed on the terrace to say goodbye to my parents who came out to see us off. "Be careful, children. And we would ask you, Dante, not to wake us up like this anymore! ” Dad shouted to the others. Mom hugged me and they both looked at me carefully and told me they loved me and once again reminded me to be careful. "I love you too, and don't worry, everything will be fine." I smiled. As soon as I turned and walked towards Milo's car, I felt a faint puncture through my chest. At the same time, I felt too much gratitude for my parents, and I felt like I lost them at that moment. I didn't take that feeling seriously, I shook my head and sat down in the passenger seat next to Milo. We set off, along the way we picked up Arabella, whose things we packed very quickly so she wouldn't have time to quarrel with Dante. The trip was pleasant, we all enjoyed it, at least those who were in the same car as me. We all knew it was too early for talking so we kept quiet and listened to the descriptive music. We didn't travel for long, in about half an hour we had already arrived and parked both cars not far from the place where we wanted to camp. We struggled a bit with carrying all the things uphill, but we survived that, so we put them down in the desired place and sat down to rest a bit. After Arabella warned us for the third time that we should start building a campsite, we got up and shared responsibilities: Arabella and Simon set up tents, Milo arranged boxes of food and drinks, Dante and Kristen went looking for firewood, while I waited for them so I could make a fire. Since no one had breakfast we were all already very hungry so we decided to start preparing food earlier, there is no camping without a barbecue, at least for us. Luckily we have a portable freezer. Everything is flowing happily, we are joking, Kristen and Dante have already had a couple of beers, so the atmosphere is even beter than usual. "Do you remember that Hellowen when we sang Christmas songs in the streets?" Milo asked. "Yes, those were good times, what we knew then, we were just young high school students." Said Simon. "Ah, yes, that's when I went home because I didn't want to be embarrassed next to you." Arabella nodded. "I don't even remember that day that much." Dante wondered. "Of course you don't remember, you were drunk." Kristen concluded. "In fact, if I remember correctly, that singing was his idea, we all agreed that we would do it except Arabella, who ran away from us as fast as she could. We thought that what we were doing was really cool and that all passers-by would actually find it interesting, however, they threw sweets at us several times, literally, they informed everyone's parents that we were not normal. What's worse, Dante miraculously managed to get more alcohol, got even more drunk and fell asleep in a dog house in the yard of his neighbor, poor Mrs. Summers. The rest of us normally drank a little too, and while you: Milo and Simone got parental advice on drinking and having fun, Kristen and I got detention. ” I explained. "Yes, that's how it was, you remember it very well." Dante smiled. "Based on what you said, I'm still glad I didn't go with you. Hey! Be careful not to burn your grill. ” Milo awoked and turned each piece of meat to the other side. We all laughed and remembered various stories from our childhood and early youth. We have mentioned so many wonderful memories that we will never forget. Time passed pleasantly, we ate and rested a bit after lunch. The weather was wonderful so we decided to take a dip in the river in the afternoon, of course, before Dante decided it would be nice to kill himself with alcohol and entertain us all a little. Since the river side was densely overgrown with trees, we decided to make a swing for jumping into the water, that is, to tie a rope to a thick branch so that we could dive into the water from them. Of course, Arabella didn't want to jump into the water, but she was very happy to follow the making of the swing, because she knows best what to do because she is studying architecture, so no one wanted to argue with her. "Look at us behaving like children." Simon said cheerfully as Milo tried out the newly assembled swing. "I'm next!" Kristen exclaimed. "Okay, no one's going to stop you, don't worry." I said. "Yes, and where did Dante go?" Arabella asked, looking around worriedly. "I'm pretty sure he went for a beer and something else, maybe." Simon calmed her down. "So our interesting evening is already beginning." Kristen exclaimed as she jumped into the river. "Yes, although we should not stay with the water for too long because we should light the fire again before it gets dark. The weather is really beautiful, there are no clouds in the sky. It looks like we're going to have a wonderful evening for watching the stars. " Arabella noticed. We didn't want to argue with her now either, so we just jumped into the water a few more times and we spent a little more time frolicking. I really felt like a child when I jumped from a tree into the water, instead of wrinkling, I prefer to lie on the surface of the water and listen to it. Then I try not to think about anything, I try to meditate, I just relax and observe the sky and the treetops that create an endless wall next to the surface of the water. As if to protect her, I like to think of it that way. Water is precious and if we as humans do not preserve it, other beings on this planet will preserve it. We really didn't swim for a long time, we got out of the water and wrapped ourselves in towels, after which we sat on the shore to dry. Even Dante obeyed Arabella when she told him to get out of the water. We slowly dried ourselves and continued to share nostalgic moments with each other.  "Who knows what else we'll experience if we continue like this?" Simon was joking. "I don't think anyone can predict that." I said as I got up from the shore and headed back to my tent. My first thought was that the sentence in my head sounded very strange. Somehow it sounded like nothing was going to happen and like I wasn’t going to be there again tomorrow. I felt like I was falling out of their story and that feeling wasn’t bad but it made me see myself as a different person. We all went back to our tents and changed. We shared the tasks with each other again: Milo and Simon were collecting firewood, while I waited for them so I could light it. Kristen was in charge of bringing the food we had already put away after lunch, and Arabella was given the task of guarding Dante so he wouldn’t do anything stupid. We did all that before night fell, and when night fell we all gathered around the fire to have dinner and continue hanging out. We all laughed a lot, especially because Dante decided to entertain us. He started playing and singing even though he had no hearing or rhythm, but he was interesting. I think many of us hoped that we would be able to talk about some deep and emotional topics in the evening, but we all realized that we would only be able to do that when we ran out of alcohol. For now, it was great like this, Dante could always invent some new nonsense, and for the rest of us, it was always very funny. Sometime around midnight, Dante decided to sing us some opera, and after a few minutes we told him it was time for bed. We brought him into his tent, and after that and after we put out the campfire, we went to bed in our tents. Kristen and I shared my tent. She wanted us to continue hanging out but I told her I was very tired, especially after Dante woke us up this morning. So we all slowly fell asleep. The weather was really calm and quiet, no one had difficulty falling asleep. 

In the very early morning hours, I felt some coldness on me and something started to pull me out of my sleep. When I realized in my half-sleep that I was actually hearing shouts outside the tent, I rose abruptly, breathing fast. I felt my chest expand and contract as I inhaled the cold air and exhaled the heat from my body. I didn't see anything, but it wasn't dark. Lights shone in front of my eyes, blinding me. I still heard shouts but I couldn't tell whose. It was as if I had heard Arabella and the boys, but along the way it was as if I had heard more voices. I heard several unfamiliar voices that sounded like bloody screams to me, who is that? What happens? I tried to shake my head hard and wake up, I looked at Kristen who was sleeping to my right. I quickly shook her and told her she had to wake up and help me see what was going on. She was trying to wake up while I was already putting on my sneakers and already out of the tent. The wind was blowing hard outside, it was not raining, but the clouds looked scary, they were brownish. It kept flashing and thundering, could it be that those unknown shouts were actually thunder? There was so much lightning that the lightning could hardly be noticed, everything looked like a light show. It took me a few minutes to notice what was really going on, the wind was blowing so much that it almost blew away Arabella's tent. She was already largely outside and trying to get him back in place. Both Milo and Simon tried to help her. And I ran quickly to them as Kristen came out of the tent. "How can we help?" I shouted, trying to overcome the storm. "Look at what else needs to be fixed in the camp and check if something has flown away!" Simon shouted. I ran around confused, counting all the tents and equipment. At one point I thought I saw Dante's tent open, I began to slowly approach it, narrowing my eyes so I could see better. Suddenly I felt something push me and I fell to the ground. Suddenly a male figure ran past me, I turned around and when I saw that Simon and Milo were still at Arabella's tent, I thought that Dante was running next to me. I saw that he continued to run towards the forest. “Stop! Don't go there alone! ” I ran after him. I didn't know where I was running, I just noticed that I was flying past the trees at high speed. It was still very bright and only then did I see a man running in front of me. I slowly began to wake up and everything started to look weirder than it already was: the man in front of me no longer looked like Dante, in fact I had never seen a similar man, he looked very strange. He was very strangely dressed. He was wearing some kind of shiny armor and when I approached him, I noticed that he had a sword. When I saw that, I started to return to reality and I started to notice everything around me again. I started to hear the others calling and looking for me, then I slowed down and caught my breath again. The man who was running in front of me disappeared, and I didn't know where I was. When I turned to go back I heard a loud thunder right next to me and suddenly my chest started to hurt a lot. Everything just disappeared, specifically everything. I saw nothing more, and I heard nothing more. I wasn't there anymore. 

A 19-year-old girl, Eli Michael, went missing on a nearby mountain yesterday morning. We ask all persons who know something about her whereabouts to contact either the local security authorities or her concerned parents. Search operations have also been launched and every volunteer is welcome to help in the search for her.