"Lewis!"
A shouting could be heard from across the parking lot. The large, middle-aged man called out to the bus. Coach Anders was trying to get the attention of a spaced-out fourteen year old currently staring out at nothing in the parking lot, hands in his pockets.
Connor Lewis pulled his hands from his pockets, partly due to being snapped out of his trance, and partly to check the time on his phone. It was 8:45am, only 45 minutes since he had arrived at school earlier that day. His entire school was having some massive school trip to the newly opened Washington Preserve and Zoological Park, though the local news had taken to simply calling it the WPZ. It was the largest, most diverse, and most advanced way to see the many faces of nature on the West Coast. Located just outside of Seattle, the city had spent and untold amount of money to create the park and even more to advertise it. Connor reasoned it was likely equal parts to drum up tourism and seem like a progressive, animal-friendly move. The WPZ had been touting it's more open and intimate enclosures provided more freedom and happiness for the animals and even it's many varieties of exotic plants. The massive park was unlike any other, the classes there actually had a 3 day-pass, planning to stay in the resort on-site. Connor was more looking forward to the resort, along with many of the students he knew. They had several restaurants, a large water park including wave pools, hot tubs, water slides, and was even adjacent to one of the parks several aquariums. Connor was rather excited, as was the norm for many of the students. This lavish experience was even being provided for by the state as part of a program to encourage wildlife-friendly lifestyles, but Connor chocked it up to them trying to seduce kids to spend money there for many years to come. Connor was a bit of a cynic, though not anywhere near enough to be annoying to those around him.
He lowered his hoodie, despite the light sprinkle of rain coming down. His medium length brown hair started to collect droplets of rain as his hood collected on the back of his neck. His brown eyes shifted from side to side before he saw the somewhat irritated face of Coach Anders.
"Lewis, come on, kid. We gotta check in at the front gate.", Coach Anders said. In all honesty, he was just as eager as the students to be there, after all, this was effectively three days of paid vacation at a resort. All he had to do was chaperone for a few kids.
Connor started to walk toward the rest of his class, one of 12 from his middle-school, 4 classes for each, sixth, seventh and eighth grade.
He approached some of his friends, Miles, Simon, Sabrina and Amanda. His friends were mostly garnered from their shared homeroom back in sixth grade, though through the years they had all developed more different interests, many of them not aligning. Despite this, though, their friend group remained tighter than most.
Connor is the one of the group that is into games. His time spent at home is mostly on his computer or in front of his television. His brown hair is slightly curly and he is rarely found in less or more than a t-shirt, hoodie and a pair of jeans. Very sarcastic, and always seeming to have something to say, he would certainly be the most likely to start a conversation in the group, though he isn't very charismatic. His mother Grace, 38, and his father, David, 40, run a relaxed household and aren't very pushy toward Connor, his younger brother, Luke, 11 years old, or his sister, Lainey, 8 years old.
Miles is on the football team, and is perhaps the schools star linebacker. Big, even for his age, the 15 year old is bit shorter than Ethan, though he had a considerable amount of muscle and has very broad shoulders, leading to an imposing frame. His friends would describe him as a teddy bear, though, at least off the football field. Emotionally mature for his age, he always seems to be the one to diffuse any tension in the group and is always the shoulder to cry on. His girlfriend Jessica is a cheerleader, blonde and blue eyed. Jessica mostly hangs out with other girls on the cheer squad though, rarely interacting with Miles' friends. Miles normally wears sweatpants and a t-shirt or a tank-top.
Simon took a serious liking to the dramatic readings they did in seventh grade English class and is eagerly awaiting high school to join the drama club and any classes associated with it. Bitten by the acting bug, he is constantly humming musicals to himself and talking about actors he is currently studying, and by studying he simply means watching television and films. Simon has short brown hair on the sides that is longer on top and falls to the side. His boyfriend Charlie is also into acting, and they bonded over their interest over last summer. Simon is cocky, and charismatic. He certainly entertains his friends immensely with his comments and attitude. Simon is typically dressed trendy in cardigans and nice jackets.
Sabrina is in a punk-rock band, where she is the bassist. Her shoulder length hair is originally brown but has been dyed bleach blonde. Sabrina has a bit of a chip on her shoulder, her mom out of the picture she lives with her lazy dad. Somewhat poor, her phone isn't as nice as her friends, and her clothes are a mix of punk band t-shirts and accessories from Hot-Topic and jeans from Wal-Mart. Sabrina has problems with authority figures, which often gets her in trouble at school. She has many times been sent to detention for cursing at teachers. Her friends find her attitude endearing though, her crassness and confidence refreshing to them. Her boyfriend Vincent is the lead singer in their band, his messy black hair hanging in his eyes. Vincent isn't around their friend group much, finding people like Miles and Simon distasteful.
Amanda is originally from North Carolina. Amanda has long brown wavy hair that goes most of the way down her back, usually styled in some way. Her family is rather wealthy, moving to Washington only 3 years ago. Amanda met the others shortly after moving. Her thick southern accent sometimes gets her mocked, though her friends are quick to shut down any harassment coming her way. Her family owns a ranch just outside the city, and she is quite good at riding horses. Amanda speaks carefully and eloquently, her parents instilling southern manners in her from a young age. Though she hasn't said anything, or even hinted, she is becoming rather interested in Connor, developing a bit a of a crush on him.
Daniel approached his friends with his hands back in the pockets of his hoodie. Coach Anders was thankfully now distracted with telling some other kids where to go. The students were tasked with staying together while the teachers checked in at the front game of the WPZ.
"Hey, man.", Miles said. "Coach Anders was about to bust a blood vessel." Miles laughed as he looked at Coach Anders, the man looking exasperated as he inspected the stapled papers explaining how to check in his group of students.
"Yeah, that would be a shame.", Sabrina said, rolling her eyes. "Jackass needs to chill out for once."
Simon was currently lost in thought, tapping away on his phone as he occasionally looked up.
"I don't know guys, I think he might be under a good bit of stress.", Amanda said. "I think ya'll might be a little hard on him."
"I just wish he'd be a little quieter...", Connor said as he looked to the side.
"Your shoelace came untied, bud.", Simon said looking down then back up at Connor.
"Ugh...", Connor said as he kneeled down, one knee on the wet pavement as he leaned down to tie his shoe. Just as he was getting done, he looked to his right and saw a stone. It was odd, though. It seemed to be changing colors, first red, then teal, then amber. Connor reached out and picked up the stone. It felt warm in his hand. It was no larger than a dime, and it began to grow from warm to hot. Just as he was about to drop the stone due to the heat being uncomfortable, his eyes widened as he saw something disturbing but felt something worse. The heat began to sink into his skin as the stone began to shrink, only it wasn't. It was dissolving into his skin. Connor shook his hand but the stone didn't come loose. He turned his hand to see the top of hand glow slightly under the skin, first red, then teal, then amber. As he turned his hand over to look at his palm, the stone was gone, and so was the glowing. Trying to contain himself and not panic, he showed no evidence of what had just happened. He knew if he told his friends they would think he was either lying or insane. He did his best to try to and process what happened, but right as he began to stand up, his head rang in pain.
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