Chapter 7 Chapter 6

When Dylan opened her eyes, she was back on the train.She blinked, confused for a while, and finally shrugged slightly, accepting this unimaginable change.The train jerked violently as it passed the switch, then settled down again, rocking softly with a low rumble.She closed her eyes again and rested her head on the seat. It seemed that only a second passed, and when she opened her eyes again, she felt a strange feeling.She frowned in confusion.She must have just dozed off again.The light in the carriage made her squint her eyes, and she shook her head slightly to clear her head.Dylan shifted uncomfortably in his seat.The woman's bag took up so much space around it that it was outrageous.An orange tote bag contained something that hurt her ribs.

She remembered her promise to text her dad to tell him she was in the car now.She took the phone out of her pocket with some difficulty.An oversized shopping bag followed suit, rolling to the edge of the seat and nearly falling.The woman on the opposite side stretched out her hand and pushed the bag up again.Dylan heard her click his tongue angrily, but ignored it.She unlocked her phone's screen and started editing text messages. Dad, I'm in the car.Not too late... The car body jolted suddenly, her elbow shook, and the phone fell from her fingers.She grabbed it with her other hand, but only touched the bottom of the phone, and the phone flew further away from her.With a snap, the phone fell to the ground.Dylan heard the scrape of the phone as it slid across the car.

She yelled "It's over" to herself, and groped her fingers on the floor for a few seconds before finally touching her mobile phone.The phone is sticky, some idiot must have spilled juice on the floor.Dylan picked up the phone to inspect the damage. It wasn't juice, the phone was covered with a viscous dark red substance, which slowly dripped down her heart-shaped phone pendant, wetting a small piece of her jeans at the knees.As soon as she raised her head, her eyes met the eyes of the woman opposite for the first time, and those eyes were also staring at herself without any trace of life.Blood trickled down her scalp, her mouth opened wide, her blue lips drawn back in a scream.Dylan looked around aimlessly and happened to see the two Rangers fans she had tried to avoid earlier.They were lying there with their arms around each other, and the positions of the two heads were not right.The car body was bumped again, and the two of them plopped forward like marionettes and fell down.There are only a few thin tendons between their heads and necks.The world turned upside down, and Dylan opened his mouth and yelled.

It started with a horrible, high-pitched noise that rattled Dylan, sawing through every nerve in her body, the sound of metal rubbing against each other.The lights flickered and the whole train seemed to jerk and jerk beneath her feet.Throwing her forward from her seat with such force, she struggled through the carriage and fell headfirst onto the terrifying woman ahead.The woman's arms seemed to be ready to embrace her, and her wide open mouth widened even further, seeming to be grinning ferociously. "Dylan!" A strange voice at first awakened her consciousness, "Dylan, wake up!" Someone shook her shoulder vigorously.

Panting heavily, Dylan jerked her head up from the table on which she must have fallen asleep just now.At this time, she saw a pair of blue eyes, full of concern. "You were yelling just now," Tristan said, worry and anxiety in his voice for the first time. The terrifying dream was still fresh, the woman's death laugh was still dangling in front of Dylan's eyes, and the adrenaline in his veins was still gushing.None of this is true, not true.As consciousness gradually recovered, her breathing gradually calmed down. "Nightmare." She muttered in a low voice, extremely embarrassed.She straightened up, avoiding his gaze, and looked around.The fire in the fireplace had long since been extinguished, but the first rays of morning light had begun to illuminate the sky, and the surroundings were already clearly visible.

The hut looked a little colder in the morning light.All four walls had been painted before, but had faded and started to peel.Holes in the roof and missing windows allowed moisture to seep into the walls, where patches of moss spread.The furniture and objects discarded by the owner look a little sad. Dylan imagined someone, at some time in the past, who had furnished a room so carefully that each item contained a special meaning and emotion.And now they are all abandoned here, no one cares about them. I don't know which muscle was wrong, but thinking of this, Dylan whimpered. Her throat was tight, and tears were about to come out of her eyes and down her cheeks.What's wrong with her?

"We're leaving." Tristan interrupted her thoughts, pulling her back to reality. "Okay." She was a little excited, and her voice became hoarse.Tristan glanced at her. "How are you?" "It's okay." Dylan took a deep breath, trying to give Tristan a smile.She felt that her words were not convincing, but she hoped that Tristan didn't know her deeply enough to see through her own thoughts.His eyes narrowed slightly, but he nodded anyway. "Then, what's your plan?" She deliberately looked relaxed and happy, covering up the embarrassing scene just now.In a way, it worked.

He raised half of his mouth and smiled, then walked towards the door, "Let's walk, that way." He pointed with his hand, then put his hands on his hips, waiting for her to join. "Now?" Dylan asked, a little in disbelief. "Yes." He replied and disappeared outside the door.Dylan stared at the door frame he had just passed through, momentarily stunned.They couldn't just walk like this, they didn't take a sip of the water in the river, they didn't find something to eat, they didn't even have a simple rinse.She wondered how he would react if she just sat here and didn't go with him.Maybe he'll keep going.

"Tristan, this is ridiculous." "What else?" He turned to Dylan, anger evident in his eyes. "We've been walking for hours and hours." "anything else?" "The place where the train accident happened was only an hour's drive north of Glasgow. There is no way to go in this Scottish wasteland. At the end of the day, there is nothing and nothing." He looked at Dylan, eyeing her slyly. "What are you trying to say?" he asked. "What I'm trying to say is, we're definitely going in circles. If you really knew where we were going, we'd be there by now." Dylan had his hands on his hips, ready to argue with him.But to her surprise, Tristan's face looked almost relieved.This made her a little confused, "We can't just keep walking like this." She added.

"Do you have any better ideas?" "Yes, better idea is to stay in the railway tunnel, someone will find us." He laughed again.The morning concerns about her had long since dissipated, and the arrogant, mocking Tristan was back. "It's too late to go back now," he snickered, before turning around and walking on.Dylan watched his back suspiciously.He was rude and bossy beyond belief. "No, Tristan, I'm serious, stop!" She tried to sound authoritative in her voice, but even to her own ears it sounded like a desperate plea. Even after ten meters away, she could still hear his impatient sigh.

I want to go back. He turned his face to her again, and it could be seen that he tried his best to keep a calm expression, "No." She stared at him dumbfounded.Who did he think he was?He's just a teenager, not her mother.She couldn't believe he thought he could make her run around.She changed her hands that were originally on her hips into a folded arms posture, stood firm, and was ready to do it. "What do you mean no? You can't decide where I'm going, no one gives you that power. You're as lost as I am. I'm going back now." She emphasized every syllable in the last sentence She changed her tone, as if her words carried so much weight in the first place. "You can't go back, Dylan. It's gone." Dylan was confused by his words, she frowned, her lips were drawn into a line, "What are you talking about? What's missing?" His mysterious words started to upset her. "Not there, understand? Not anymore." He shook his head, as if trying to come up with the right word, "Hey, trust me." He fixed Dylan's burning eyes. "We've come this far. It's a long way to go back and find the tunnel. I really know where we're going, I promise." Dylan shifted her weight back and forth with her feet, and she hesitated again.She was anxious to get back to the place where the accident happened, she was sure that there was always someone responsible, there was always someone who dealt with the accident there.But on the other hand, she couldn't find it alone, and she was afraid of being abandoned in the wilderness.Tristan seemed to sense that she was undecided, and turned to walk beside her, the distance between them was too close for her to feel comfortable.He bent his knees to meet Dylan's eye level.She tried to take a few steps back, but froze in place like a rabbit caught in the headlights of a car.A familiar image flashed across Dylan's memory, but then he kept looking directly at her, their gazes so close, that her mind wandered again. "We need to go this way," he whispered hypnotically, "you have to come with me." He stared at her intently, watching her pupils gradually dilate until they almost covered the blue eyes, and then smiled with satisfaction. "Come on." He ordered. Without even thinking about it, Dylan followed obediently. On and on, on and on, they seemed forever trudging through the muddy swamps of the Highlands.Dylan's legs were moaning, and his running shoes were already wet. With every step, the shoes creaked.Her flared jeans were so saturated they were almost wet to the knees.Every step is extremely difficult. Tristan was unmoved whether she glared or complained in a low voice.He relentlessly walked at his own pace, without saying a word, with a firm will, always keeping a distance of about one meter in front of her.Occasionally when she stumbled, he would turn his head to look.However, once he was sure she was okay, he would resolutely move on. Dylan began to feel more and more awkward.The silence between them was like a completely impenetrable brick wall.He seemed to hate being with her, as if he had been forced to make the promise to take care of her troublesome little sister.And she had no choice but to keep playing her part—the little girl, pissed off because she couldn't get her way, dragging her weary pace and continuing to follow him.Dylan was now cowering, afraid to resist his unfriendly, even hostile behavior in the slightest.She tucked her chin into her coat and sighed.She looked down at the luxuriant grass under her feet. The holes in the grass and all kinds of strange-shaped clods tried to trip her up. She tried to avoid these places, but it was still in vain.She sighed softly, then continued to follow Tristan with heavy steps. At the top of another mountain, he finally stopped, "Do you need to rest for a while?" Dylan looked up. She had walked with her head buried for a long time, and now she couldn't tell the difference between east, west, and north. "Okay, that's great." She felt like she hadn't spoken for a long time, and now she needed to whisper a few words.However, as soon as the words came out, they were swept away by the biting mountain wind.However, he seemed to understand.There was a huge boulder standing among the weeds and heather. He walked forward slowly, leaned against the stone coldly, as if he was on guard, and looked at the wilderness. Dylan didn't have the energy to find a suitable, dry place. She collapsed on the spot, and the water from the weeds seeped into her coat in an instant.But her shoes and jeans were already soaked, so she barely noticed.She was too tired to say a word, or even think about anything.She was now distraught, and she followed without thinking where Tristan led her.Maybe that's what he had planned all along, she thought sullenly. It was strange, she knew in her heart that something was wrong.In fact, they walked most of the two days without meeting anyone; in fact, she hadn't eaten or drank since the accident, but she was neither hungry nor thirsty; the last fact —and the scariest part—she hadn't contacted her parents for forty hours, and they didn't know where she was or that she was okay.For some reason, these thoughts lingered in her head and troubled her all the time, but these troubles only came on faintly, like a few gentle tugs on the tail of a galloping horse.She couldn't concentrate on these things. Suddenly, Tristan glanced at her. She was lost in her own thoughts and didn't look away in time. "What's wrong?" he asked. Dylan bit his lip, trying to figure out which of the million questions he'd had to ask him first.Chatting with him was too much work, and he never asked any questions about her personally.Wasn't he curious at all?The only conclusion Dylan could draw was that he wished she hadn't been there at all.Maybe he'd rather have started walking as soon as he got out of the tunnel, and never had to wait to see who else showed up.Dylan wasn't sure if that would have been better for her, either.She could have stayed at the mouth of the tunnel.If no one came, she could have persuaded herself to go back through the tunnel and come out the other side.Then she would be home by now, probably arguing with Joan about going to Aberdeen again. From the left came a distant howl, high and shrill, like the cry of an animal in pain.The cry seemed to echo in the surrounding mountains, adding a bit of eerie and weirdness.Dylan shivered involuntarily. "What's that?" she asked Tristan. He shrugged, obviously not thinking about it, "It's just an animal. They brought back a few wolves a while ago. Don't worry." After he finished speaking, he saw the nervousness on her face, and added with a smile, "There's plenty of deer around here for them to eat, and they won't bother you." He looked up at the increasingly cloudy sky.Before Dylan knew it, it was dusk again.Surely they haven't been gone that long?She crossed her arms to keep herself warm.The wind suddenly became stronger, blowing her hair disheveled.The long hair danced in front of her eyes, like waves and shadows rippling.She tried to brush her hair aside, but her outstretched fingers caught only air. Tristan turned away from the rock he was leaning on and said, looking into the dusk, "We've got to get going though. We don't want to be stuck on top of the mountain when it's dark." It was very dark in a short time, unbelievably fast. As they trudged down the hill, Dylan found it hard to see.This side of the mountain top is full of gravel, and the feet will slip when stepping on it.And it has just rained recently, and the rocks on the mountain are also slippery.She walked forward as cautiously as possible, first taking a small step slowly, and only after one foot stood firmly, the other began to hesitantly poke on the ground.It was going very slowly this way, and she could feel Tristan getting impatient again.Still, she was somewhat relieved that he folded back and walked alongside her, the arm closest to her half-extended, ready to catch her if she fell.In addition to the sound of the wind and her breathing, she could faintly hear the howling of nocturnal animals. "Stop." Tristan stretched out his arm in front of Dylan.He stopped so suddenly that Dylan was startled, and she turned and stared at him.When she saw his standing posture clearly, she couldn't help shivering with fright.He stood motionless and alert.Every muscle in the body was tensed, ready to fight. His eyes were fixed on the front, and he walked quickly with small steps while scanning around.His brows were furrowed, his lips were tight.No matter what is ahead, it must come from bad people.