Chapter 4: Into the game..

"What the fuck is happening?" Jaxon panicked.

Everything in the room started levitating including Orion and Jaxon.

The TV screen exploded in a blaze of light, and the room is bathed in an intense, pulsating glow. The friends shield their eyes, stumbling backwards as the couch disappeared beneath them.

Jaxon shouted, "I told you not to. I told you to quit the game!"

"I'm sorry, I should have listened," Orion pleaded.

The intense light dimmed allowing them to open their eyes.

Orion shouted, "shit, we are we? No, no, no!"

They found themselves standing in the swirling vortex, colours bleeding together like watercolors in the rain. The air was electric, and the ground trembled beneath their feet.

Orion saw a pole and recognized it.

He swayed and swung, trying to reach the pole.

Upon reaching it, he shouted it "Jaxon, give me your hand!"

Jaxon looked up to see Orion hanging onto a pole. He looked down and saw how things were being sucked into the swirling vortex. He did not want to be next.

He leapt with all his strength and grabbed Orion's hand. Orion using all the strength he could gather in his body…pulled Jaxon far enough for him to grab onto the pole.

"Hang on'" Orion screamed.

"What do you think I'm tryna do?" Jaxon replied.

The portal vortex's pull intensified, and despite grabbing onto nearby objects, the suction was too powerful.

Jaxon felt his fingers slipping, "I'm slipping…I can't hold on much longer."

Orion held onto the pole with one hand and held onto Jaxon with the other.

"Shit!" Orion spat out! "What?"

"I'm slipping too."

With a final, desperate cry, they were both sucked into the vortex. The room fell silent, the TV screen now lifeless, and everything fell back into place.

The vortex intensified, and the friends felt themselves being stretched, compressed, and pulled apart. Their screams were lost in the cacophony of sound and color.

They felt themselves falling through a seemlessly endless void. Time lost all meaning as they plummeted towards an uncertain fate.

Then, suddenly, they fell with a thud on a dry, cracked somewhere.

The impact knocked the wind outta Orion, and he lay there, gasping for breath.

As he struggled to sit up, a sharp pain shot through his back. "Ow, that hurt," he groaned, stretching his sore muscles.

Groggily, Orion looked around, taking in their desolate surroundings. They were in a scarred forest, withering trees that seemed to writhe in agony. The air reeked of decay, and the sky was a deep foreboding purple. An eerie aura hung over the landscape, sending shivers down his spine.

"Where are we?" he muttered to himself, scrambling to his feet.

That's when he saw Jaxon, lying motionless on the ground a few feet away. Orion's heart skipped a beat as he rushed to Jaxon's side.

"Hey, hey, jaxon," he called, gently nudging his head. "Hey, hey, Jaxon… c'mon wake up. You can't die on me."

But no response. Jaxon was pale, his body bruised from the fall.

Orion's mind raced with fear. What had happened to them? How did they get here? And where was 'here', exactly?

As he looked around again, orion realized that they were completely alone in this twisted forest. No signs of life, no sounds of birds or animals. Just an oppressive silence, punctuated only by faint whisper of dark energy.

"Jaxon, come on, buddy," Orion whispered, shaking him again. "We need to get out of here."

Orion's hand instinctively went to the back of Jaxon's head, cradling it as he tried to rouse his friend. But as he did, he felt something warm and sticky dripping off his hand.

He pulled it back, and his heart sank. Blood.

"Shit!" Orion exclaimed, his kind racing with panic.

He gently turned Jaxon over, and his worst fears were confirmed. Jaxon's head was bleeding, a gash on the back of his skull oozing crimson liquid onto the dry earth.

Orion's eyes widened in horror. What had he done? If only he listened to Jaxon, if only they hadn't been sucked into this…this..where ever this was.

As he stared at Jaxon's wound, a red light flickered to life on his friend's chest. Orion's eyes narrowed, confusion etched on his face.

"Respawn?" he read aloud, unsure what it meant.

The red light vanished, replaced by a warm, white glow that enveloped Jaxon's body. Orion watched, awestruck, as the light seeped into Jaxon's cuts and bruises, illuminating his skin from within.

The light pulsed, growing brighter, and Orion shielded his eyes. When he opened them again, he saw the wound on the back of Jaxon's head slowly closing, the bleeding stopped. The light faded, leaving Jaxon's skin unmarked.

Jaxon's eyes fluttered open, his hand ruffling through his hair as he sat up, looking around in confusion. "Where are we?" he asked, his voice groggy.

Orion was so overjoyed that Jaxon was alive that he pounced on him, kissing him squarely on the lips. "Mmuah!" he exclaimed, brushing his lips against Jaxon's.

"You're alive! Never scare me like that ever again."

Jaxon was shocked, his eyes wide with surprise. He couldn't talk, couldn't move, couldn't process what was happening.

Orion was just checking for bruises, but there was none. "How? You were dead minutes ago!" he exclaimed, still in awe.

Jaxon touched his lips, stunned, trying to process the kiss and the sudden turn of events.

Before any questions could fly,the earth beneath them shook. A shadow figure, enormous and menacing, loomed over them.

Jaxon looked up, his heart racing. "Orion, watch out!" he yelled, pushing Orion out of the way and rolling away.

A giant troll emerged from the trees, its axe as big as a car. Jaxon and Orion ran, ducking behind the nearest trees.

Orion lost his cool, "what the fuck was that?"

he whispered, eyes wide with fear.

Jaxon shushed him, holding a finger to his lips.

The giant troll roared, "GRAAAGH! You two little morsels will make perfect meal for Gristle, the greatest troll of all."

Orion screamed silently, "shit!"