Step by step, the expedition team slowly trudged their way below the canopy of the forest as they delved deeper and deeper into its wooden embrace. They were currently walking in a formation, with Alexandra at the front as the face tank, Cynthia and Astra walking side by side in the next position, then Alfie and Fox, then finally Erik and Seth.

With Alexandra in their party, stealth was never going to be an option. Never mind stepping on a twig, she was more likely to topple a tree by accidentally bumping into it. At least that's what they thought at first, but the more they walked through this forest, the more Seth got a decidedly eery vibe from these trees.

However, no matter how hard he looked. Seth couldn't figure out exactly what was giving him that vibe, he couldn't figure out what was wrong with the trees. They were completely and utterly normal trees. Boringly normal, the text book example of what a tree should be. It was a little disappointing actually, to find out it was so basic.

But at least there was something he could kill, even if it wasn't some horrifying mutant tree that sucked the moisture out of people or something.

He already had his [Little Prick] flying through the foliage in its arrow size, spearing through the ants that crawled across the branches above them.

He wasn't the only one to notice them, just the best equipped to deal with them. Others were slicing them apart or blasting them away when they noticed some too, but often these ants would scamper away given the chance.

They were just watching not even trying to attack them. Just watching, laying in wait for something. Clearly they were walking towards what these beasts considered to be a trap, but they could at least be a bit more subtle about it.

No, the spying ants were decidedly not the issue with the forest. Seeing them behaving this way actually gave Seth a small amount of comfort, as if at least something was right in the world and made sense. At least... by the new worlds standards. Making no sense, strangely, was just what made sense now.

Pausing his thought process for a moment, Seth tilted his head to the side as if he was rolling a ball of thoughts around in his head. Rolling it backwards, he considered that last thought. Making no sense was what felt right now...

Casting his eyes over the trees once more, Seth analysed them closely. It was the fifth time he was doing this ever since they had entered, but before he had been looking for oddities. He had been looking for something malevolent hiding behind the normality. He was looking for the demonic face behind the smiling mask.

Instead, perhaps he should have been focusing on the mask itself, on the normality.

He traced his hand across the trunk of a tree as he passed by it, subconsciously lifting his foot a little higher to step over a knot in one of its roots. His eyes scanned the trees, taking in every little detail no matter how plain and ordinary it might seem.

The pattern of the leaves, the small bite marks out of them from caterpillars, the web of branches hanging above him, the texture and smell of the bark. Even the twisted faces that appeared in the trunks themselves. Not real faces of course, simply holes and darkened patches from sap that his brain twisted into faces.

Those had been the first thing that he had inspected when he was looking for malevolent secrets. Stepping another knot in the roots, Seth pondered what it could be, and then paused once again.

His eyes trailed downwards, looking at the knot he had subconsciously stepped over. He had been doing that for a while now, stepping over a knot, ever since he scuffed his foot against one. But how did he always know where to lift his foot and how high?

It's not as if the knots could all be the same height... could they?

"You noticed it too, huh?"

Erik spoke softly to him, leaning closer as they were walking. Seth narrowed his eyes at the aquamarine man. He didn't know much about him, in all honesty. He hadn't asked all that many questions about him, simply fighting alongside him because he was there and seemed to be a good person.

That was one of the remnants of his old anti-social life. The ability to randomly make friends and not know a damn thing about them. I mean look how long it took him to find out Fox's name... or his teachers.

He was fighting alongside this man, trusting him with his back, and he didn't even know something basic like his favourite colour. Blue, hopefully.

But then again, was that really important? Was anything more important than the knowledge of what he would do when shit hits the fan and things are looking grim? Favourite colour wasn't going to help him much when a beasts claw is coming down on his neck.

Seth considered these mad ramblings in his head, along with what the blue man had said before nodding softly.

"I think so... They are the same, aren't they? The same tree, I mean."

"That's my belief, yeah. Look at the leaves. Second lowest branch, twenty fourth leaf from the trunk. You see it?"

Seth took a moment, narrowing his eyes at the nearest tree and scrutinizing the branches just like Erik had said. It took him a few seconds to find the specific one he was talking about, but when he finally got the count right he bobbed his head in confirmation.

"Good, Look at the bite marks it has on it. Probably from a caterpillar or something, it's not really important. What is important is the distinctness of that pattern. Now look at the other trees, the same leaf."

Seth nodded, looking at a few other trees chosen at random as they walked. He already had a feeling of what he would see, but seeing it for a fact cemented the theory he had in his head.

On every single tree he inspected, on the second lowest branch, the twenty fourth leaf from the trunk always had a distinctive cut in its green body.

Every cut exactly the same, down to the smallest bite mark, in exactly the same place.

"Well damn... You've got some good eyes on you. I had to trip over the answer for it to finally click. So what do you think, clone trees?"

"Maybe... Probably. Their placement is far too deliberate too. There's none of the chaos of nature, nothing overlapping or collapsing. They might seem randomly positioned, but they're not. Even in their random placement, they are still evenly placed.

I used to go camping a lot with one of my exes, they loved the woods. I've shit in enough of them to be called a bear, so trust me when I tell you that nothing about these trees are natural. Something put them here deliberately."

This conversation wasn't exactly being held with hushed tones or any intention of keeping the details secret, so their entire procession was privy to their revelations. Seth could even see, out of the corner of his eye, a few of their groups members checking the particular leaf that was being discussed. A few of them had more trouble finding it than others, Cynthia especially seemed to have trouble finding it before simply giving up.

Of course, whether they found the particular leaf or not, the main question on their minds naturally became 'If someone had placed them here, then who? And for what reason?'

Well. technically that was two questions.

It was a question, or two questions if you want to be particular about it, that seemed like they were going to be answered soon. As they strode through the forest, cutting down ants as they walked, the silhouette of a figure could be seen in the distance before them. A silhouette that, as far as they could tell, did not seem like it belonged to an ant. But it didn't exactly look human either.