We trusted him, we followed him, and we loved him.
Before my friend Wayne's dumbfounding discovery, I always believed that the supernatural and, well, the magical, were simply something unseen. Something that an ordinary person like myself would have significant trouble trying to find. However, since then, Wayne has shown me a new thing... He showed me the power one could wield through the will of Malcainum. Even a mere fraction was enough to convince me of the good they preached.
My name is Aborus. In this journal, there is a firsthand account of my experience with the man called Alvaenu Malcainum.
Wayne and I go way back, I mean WAY back. When my family first moved to Sea Shore, we knew no one. Two young parents with a three-year-old boy, hoping to build a life for themselves. To establish their own family and develop strong and lasting connections.
On my first day of preschool, a boy who was the same age as me introduced himself. I was a shy kid, but I also wanted to make friends, so I shook his hand, and we became acquainted.
For the first couple of years, he did most of the talking. Wayne dragged me everywhere, and we did many things together. Throughout kindergarten and grade one, he helped me open up a lot, and our friendship blossomed.
Wayne was always the more curious type. I went along with him, if reluctantly, but never dared spearhead our crusades and adventures. Middle school and high school were much the same when it came to the activities we partook in after school hours. From hiking anywhere, working out, or road trips, we were thick as thieves. When graduation came along, we planned to attend the same college and take the same courses.
Give or take, a couple of months into our sophomore year, we started hearing rumors of a skilled magician, you know, the type who does card tricks or disappearing acts. Right? Right?! Actually, although he did occasionally perform your typical magic trick, his signature antics were rather odd. Causing a snake to lay a chicken egg, getting a cat down from a tree by disappearing and reappearing it on the ground, or crushing rocks and turning the powdered stone into clean drinking water. Most dismissed these things as the highest kind of skill a performer could have, though some equated what they saw to acts of miracles.
What did Wayne and I think of this? First, we'd have to see it for ourselves; it was harder than you'd think. Yeah, I'll admit, these were rumors, but many of the students we interacted with claimed to have witnessed the signs that these rumors were about.
Then, one day, as I was walking to class, Wayne ran up to me, excited, shaking, confused?
"What is it?" I asked, "Why are you spazzing out like a tweaking madman?" Catching his breath, he began slowly.
"He came to me!"
"Who did? Who is he?"
"He calls himself Malcainum, the miracle worker, magician dude. He stopped me on my way out and said that he noticed us trying to find him, that the dedication we "showed him" was what he was looking for, I guess. Whatever that means..."
"And then???" I urged. "Was that it?"
"No, uh, he told me to meet him alone in the woods off campus at three a.m. tomorrow."
"Hella sketchy, what about me? He told you to meet him? I thought he referred to "us" as in "us". Did he say where you were supposed to meet?" I asked Wayne.
"No, I didn't think to ask..."
Just then, the old janitor was walking by with his mop and bucket. He leaned close to Wayne's ear and whispered something into it. When he passed, Wayne turned to me and said,
"He'll find me..." Wayne's eyes looked dark; he was spooked.
"Are you second-guessing?" I asked. "Maybe we should rethink this whole thing."
"No, I want to see what this is all about. We need to follow this through." Wayne still seemed a bit uncomfortable and switched the subject. "We're still meeting with Justin tomorrow for studying, right?" Justin was Wayne's roommate who always slept past noon.
"That's right," I said. "Four o'clock." He gave me a thumbs up, and we entered our Computer Science class.
I didn't want Wayne to go alone, and he agreed that we should investigate this together. Don't get me wrong, there were plenty of red flags in this whole endeavor, but the adventurous hearts of two young men quickly ignored any signs of danger.
We got on with our day as normal and anxiously anticipated what was to come.
In the hours leading up to the encounter, I noticed a shift in how Wayne conducted himself. It was very subtle at first, but it quickly aroused my concern. Ever since that message, "He'll find you," Wayne seemed to retreat mentally and physically. My outgoing lifelong friend was not behaving normally.
As the time grew nearer, I started to worry, but convincing him to back down now was a lost cause. It would be like trying to instruct a rebellious child not to run into the woods alone, and the only choices I had were to let him go alone or follow him. Either way, he was going.
Three a.m. struck, and we headed off campus, venturing into the constructed darkness of the thick, decaying trees. Only the flash of our phones illuminated our steps, and five minutes into our little hike, an authoritative voice reverberated off the dead trunks.
"Turn around."
I fully expected to see a towering demon with rotting teeth and an evil grin, but that was not the case—not at first, not entirely. He was a man who looked to be a few years older than Wayne and me. He had shoulder-length black hair, was perhaps a couple of inches taller than us, but aside from his countenance, he seemed like a normal guy. He just stared at Wayne for several seconds, and Wayne stared back. What the hell.
"Yo, what's good?" I interjected into their—whatever it was that they were doing.
"I said come alone," Malcainum said sternly but softly.
"We're together," I said. "In this together."
"You must leave Aborus." He turned and fixed his gaze on me. How did he know my name? "I accept only one at an appointed time. It is not yet yours." The man called Malcainum continued his stare into Wayne's soul.
Wayne scowled at me, echoing the magician's sentiment.
"Aborus, you will have your chance to prove yourself. If you were ever my friend, you WILL leave."
I stood in shock, unsure of what to do next. The unwarranted hostility is what ultimately decided what I should do. I was not about to provoke further action by standing around, so I started in the direction we had come.
A few seconds passed, and before I was out of earshot, I heard Wayne chuckle a bit, then break out into a deep, but somehow cheerful laughter, and Malcainum joined in.
The friend in me was screaming to turn back and pick up Wayne like a potato sack and get him out of there. But the logical instinct was to run for my life. I had never seen or heard something so unsettling as the exchange between my best friend and whatever the hell Malcainum was. The appearance of a normal man could not mask his deeper intentions, and I vowed that I would figure out what those were.
I ran as fast as I could.
Slam! My shin crashed into something hard. Wooden? Before I knew what it was, I had flipped headfirst over the obstacle, diving into an awkward roll on the other side of it. My phone was still clutched in my hand, and I briefly looked back as I got up and saw that it was a picnic table. What is that doing way out here? I continued running toward campus, this time trying to keep my phone's light pointed forward as I pumped my arms.
When I got back, I tried to sleep. I tossed and turned all night. Barely getting a wink. I tried calling and texting Wayne multiple times throughout the night, but I didn't receive a single response. When the sun finally came up, I decided to go out and look for him. I first searched his dorm.
"Wayne, are you in there?" I called, knocking on his door. I didn't hear anything. I checked the knob, and it was unlocked. I knocked again. "I'm going to come in!" I opened the door and scanned the dorm room. Justin was sleeping, and Wayne's bed was empty. I went over to Justin and gently shook his shoulder.
"Where's Wayne?" I whispered.
"Mmhh…"
"Justin, have you seen Wayne?!" I said more urgently.
"Lemme sleep. I juss gah to bed…" Justin slurred his words, on the edge of sleep. I guess he had no idea. I let him sleep and continued my search.
I looked all over campus, asking the early risers if they had seen him, but there was no trace.
I had to comb the woods;surely, I'd find something there. I began with the place I thought we had entered and started looking around.
"Wayne!" I yelled. No reply. "WAYNE!" Still nothing.
I thought back on the night before, trying to remember a landmark or something to aid my search. The picnic table! I began scanning for any large objects that weren't trees. After a few minutes, I spotted it. I searched the ground near its metal legs for any disturbances—like upturned dirt—on either side of the structure. There! Short and shallow grooves in the dirt faintly indicated that the table had been knocked an inch or two from its original resting spot. And on the opposite side, a small area of scattered leaves revealed bare soil where I had landed. I retraced my steps to where I remembered encountering Malcainum.
"WAYNE!!!" I cupped both hands around my mouth and shouted at the top of my lungs towards the sky. I waited. Five minutes. Ten minutes. Thirty minutes, searching everywhere, shouting his name at regular intervals. Not even a bird. It was like the forest was dead. I soon realized there wasn't much else I could do, so I made my way back to civilization.
I got on with my day, trying not to worry. Telling myself that Wayne was alright, that he would return. What was he doing?
When I saw staff or faculty, I'd ask about him. It was like he had simply vanished.
Justin snuck up on me just as four o'clock had.
"You ready to study? Where's Wayne?" Justin held up his textbooks, hoping to start right away.
"I have no idea. I've been looking for him all day. None of the other students or professors have seen him either." I couldn't hide my concern.
"Well, when and where did you last see him?"
"Um…" I hesitated, thinking back on the previous night.
"The woods…" I began. "At three a.m."
"What were you guys doing in the woods? At three a.m.?!"
"It's pretty hard to explain or understand. I don't really get any of it myself."
"Try me."
I sighed. "The magician guy, we met him in the woods… He said that he would find Wayne… Something weird happened, and they wanted me to leave. I left him there. They were laughing… Wayne was acting strangely before the meeting… I don't know. It's all so bizarre…" I trailed off.
"Yeah, man, that is some crazy, bizarre shit. Wow, was I wrong… And you just left him there?"
"What was I supposed to do?! They were glaring at me; I thought Wayne was possessed or something. I was scared for my life!"
"That's rough, dude. I don't know what to say. Do you want to cancel the study?"
"No, it's fine. I guess we'll go on without him. I'm choosing to believe that Wayne will turn up eventually…"
We studied without Wayne, and it was a little harder than usual, on account of my brain reminding me now and then that Wayne was still missing.
We eventually got through it, and I headed to my dorm to make a late dinner.