Volume 1: [Perseverance 💜]
Chapter 1: Purple Soul
Act 1: Welcome to the Underground
On the outskirts of town stands a school. Behind it stretches a forest, and farther in the distance rises a mountain.
A figure emerges from among the branches and bushes: a girl with brown hair streaked with lighter strands, and glasses that fit perfectly on her serene face.
She is wearing a rather peculiar sweater: lavender, with dark purple sleeves and horizontal fuchsia stripes. She also has on dark blue shorts, black tights, and purple boots, and she carries a purple notebook under her arm.
She pushes a low branch out of her way, steps over a root, and keeps walking. Behind her, the voices from the school have faded little by little, until she can't hear them at all. Now there is only the crunch of leaves under her boots and the wind moving through the trees.
Then she sees it: a spot at the foot of a tree, where sunlight streams down through the treetops. Moss covers the roots like a soft green carpet, and patches of light shift whenever the wind moves the leaves. No noise. No people. And, after a careful look around, no bugs.
???: Finally... a quiet place to take notes.
She sits down, leans back against the trunk, and lets out a long breath. The bark is rough against her back, and the ground is still a little cool. For the first time all day, her shoulders relax.
She opens her notebook to a clean page and begins taking notes about everything around her: the light, the leaves, the sound of the wind. At the top of the page, in small, neat letters, she writes where she is: The forest behind the school and in front of a mountain.
A small brown rabbit hops out from behind a bush a few steps away. She holds her breath so she won't scare it. It sniffs the grass and twitches its ears, and she starts drawing as fast as she can.
After a while, a drawing has taken shape on the page. It's a rabbit, and a very cute one at that. When she looks up to compare, the real one is already gone. She smiles a little anyway.
That's when a very strange bird with three eyes swoops down over her, circling as if it wants to pester her. It flaps around her head, so close she can feel the wind from its wings. Before she can react, it snatches the notebook right out of her hands and tosses it into some bushes.
???: Hey!
The girl is more annoyed than scared. So annoyed, in fact, that she doesn't even notice what the bird looks like. All she can think about is her notebook, with her notes and her drawing inside. She just gets up, brushes off her shorts, and goes after it.
She approaches the bushes slowly and bends down, pushing the leaves apart to look for it. There, a corner of purple peeks out from the shadows. She reaches for it.
Behind her, the bird from before turns in the air and comes back at full speed. It crashes straight into her back.
The blow pushes her headfirst into the bushes, and hidden inside them is a hole. Her fingers close around the notebook at the same moment the ground disappears beneath her. Before she understands what is happening, she is falling, notebook and all.
She screams as she falls, and her life flashes before her eyes. Or at least, the part of it that brought her here.
{Flashback}
Boy 1: Hey, Sabrina, are you coming to watch our basketball game?
Sabrina: Of course! I'll be cheering for you from the stands, like always.
Boy 2: I can't wait for the game to start!
Voices bounced off the gymnasium walls. It was an ordinary conversation between two boys and a girl, one of dozens happening at once. Sneakers squeaked against the floor. Balls bounced. Somewhere, a whistle blew, and someone laughed far too loudly.
In the middle of all that noise, a girl in a lavender sweater and dark blue shorts—the same girl from before—sat at the end of the bleachers with her notebook open on her knees. She had tried to write the same sentence three times. Each time, a new shout broke it apart.
Finally, she closed the notebook, stood up, clutching it tightly, and left the gym without a word.
The noise was too much for the girl with glasses.
Even from the hallway, she could still hear the students inside.
Sabrina (from inside): What's wrong with her?
Boy 1 (from inside): Don't mind her. She's always like that. She keeps to herself.
She heard him. She always did. It stung a little, but she held her notebook tighter and didn't look back.
She walked down the school hallway, looking for a quiet spot to take notes. The library was full of students whispering in groups, and somehow their whispers were worse than shouting. In the courtyard, a group of kids was playing music from a phone. Even the stairwell echoed with footsteps every few seconds. She tried the art room too, but its door was locked.
She didn't give up. She kept searching, one door at a time, until she crossed paths with a teacher. Or rather, the coach of the basketball and gymnastics classes.
Coach: Paige, where are you headed?
Paige: Somewhere quiet, so I can draw and take notes.
The coach looked at her for a moment, watching the way she held her notebook.
Coach: Why don't you try the Mountain Forest? You can breathe in the peace there and enjoy some nature. And by the looks of it, they're going to send all the students home anyway. It's a good place to rest.
Paige thought about it. Trees didn't shout, and they didn't whisper in groups either.
Paige: Thank you, Coach. I'll go there.
Coach: My pleasure.
Without another word, Paige gave him a polite nod and went on her way, out of the school. The outside air hit her right in the face, fresh and cool after the stuffy hallways, and she walked with determination toward the woods behind the school building.
That place was known as "the Mountain Forest," and it had earned its name for obvious reasons. It was a mountain, yes, but what made it stand out was the thick forest surrounding its base. Students and teachers alike often went there to rest, searching for something the school walls could never offer them: silence.
{End of Flashback}
Paige: Aaaaahhhh!!!
She is still screaming, but the sound only echoes around her. The hole she fell into isn't just a hole. It's an enormous cave, so deep that the circle of daylight above her shrinks with every second.
Cold air rushes past her face. Her glasses press against her nose, and her hair whips around her head. Paige hugs her notebook to her chest, as if her life depends on it.
(Scene change)
At the very bottom of the cave lies an enormous pile of bones, lit by a thin beam of daylight that falls from the hole far above. The air down here is cool and still, and it smells like damp stone. Not far from the pile, footsteps echo from the entrance of a tunnel.
A female figure steps out of the tunnel and into the cavern. She has the shape of a woman, but she is something quite different. She walks slowly toward the pile of bones, the way someone visits a place they know by heart.
She hears a scream far above her, growing louder and closer. Without hesitating, she sprints to the top of the pile of bones. They shift and clatter under her feet, but she doesn't slow down. She looks up and sees a girl falling straight toward her.
She opens her arms. And she catches her.
For a moment, neither of them moves.
Paige's eyes are squeezed shut as she waits to hit the ground. But the impact never comes. Instead, something hard and cool is holding her, and she realizes she isn't falling anymore. Slowly, she opens her eyes and looks up at whoever is holding her.
It's a skeleton.
A real one. Pale bones, a smooth skull, and two dark eye sockets looking right at her.
???: Are you alright?
Paige stares up at the talking skeleton for exactly one second. Then she faints on the spot.
???: I should have expected that.
(The skeleton sighs.)
She shifts Paige in her arms and glances up at the hole one last time. Then, half carrying her and half dragging her, the skeleton brings Paige out of the cavern and into a smaller cave nearby, one that has been shaped to look like a house. It has a wooden door, round windows cut into the rock, and a little lantern hanging by the entrance. Inside, she lays Paige down on a bed, pulls a blanket over her, and sets the purple notebook on the table beside her.
(An hour later)
Paige wakes up slowly. The first thing she notices is how soft the bed is. The second is the ceiling above her: rough gray stone, lit by the warm glow of a candle. The blanket over her smells faintly of dust and something sweet, like dried flowers.
Her notebook sits on a small table beside the bed. She doesn't remember putting it there.
Then it all comes back at once: the bird, the hole, the endless fall, and the skeleton. Paige tells herself it was a dream. It has to have been a dream.
She tries to stand, but her legs give out beneath her, and she hits the floor with a loud thud.
Almost at once, footsteps sound outside the bedroom. They're coming closer.
Paige starts to panic. Her heart pounds in her ears. She tries to stand again, and this time, on shaky legs, she manages it. She grabs the closest thing she can find—a stick leaning against the wall—and points it at the door with both hands.
The skeleton appears in the doorway. When she sees Paige panicking, she stops and slowly raises her bony hands into the air.
???: I'm not here to take your life. Can you put the stick down?
Her voice is calm and a little tired, like someone who has had a very long day.
Paige is still suspicious, but the stick is shaking in her hands, and so are her knees. She drops it—and her legs give out again. When she finally speaks, her voice comes out as a panicked whisper.
Paige: Where am I? What is this place? Are you... really not going to take my life?
The skeleton comes closer, kneels down beside her, and hugs her.
Paige freezes. The skeleton's arms are hard and cool, nothing like a person's. But the hug is gentle, and it lasts just long enough for her breathing to slow down.
???: I'm Synn.
Synn: I'll answer all your questions in the living room. Will you let me help you get there?
A little calmer now, Paige nods. She reaches up for her notebook on the table and holds it against her chest with one arm. Then she tries to stand once more, this time with Synn's help.
Leaning on Synn's shoulder, she makes her way out of the bedroom and down a short hallway to the living room. The whole house is carved into the rock. The walls are smooth and curved, and a few shelves hold jars, books, and folded blankets. It's strange, but it isn't scary. It looks like someone's home.
Once she is sitting in a chair, Paige looks at Synn nervously. She has a hundred questions. She starts with the biggest one.
Paige: So, are you... a... monster?
Synn looks at her for a moment.
Synn: So that's what humans call us nowadays.
(Synn sighs.)
Synn: First of all, I like to call myself a creature, not a monster. And I'm pretty sure the ones out there feel the same way.
Paige nods quickly, like a student who has just been corrected by a teacher.
Paige: I-I-I see... So, where am I?
Synn: You're in the Underground.