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alongside her.
    “Yeah, well they are a regular occurrence. Just orbs of light, hovering over the forest in the distance. And then there’s the children.”
    “The children?” Erin asked, raising her eyebrows as her eyes widened.
    “Yes, ma’am. I’ve received countless reports over the years of people hearing giggling children out there. Right in the middle of the woods, where there shouldn’t be anyone. These are reports from daredevil teenagers and young adults, though. They are the only ones brave enough to go that far out there. You know, they dare each other to try and spend the night out there… that kinda stuff.”
    “Giggling children… hmm, okay. What about the disappearances?” Craig asked, his eyebrows knitting together.
    “A few people have disappeared here over the years. But to be honest, they were mostly…well, they had problems with drugs. No one was that surprised when they disappeared from the town. For all we know, they just ran off,” the Sheriff said. “Still, it’s not just that. A couple of tourists tried to camp out there once, and they disappeared too. Never heard from again.”
    A chill ran down Erin’s spine at his words. Even though their mission was to find rational explanations for everything that was reported to them, the idea of people simply disappearing into the woods, never to be seen or heard from again, bothered her more than anything else. She couldn’t imagine anything more terrifying than being taken away by something in the woods, or being trapped helplessly there for whatever reasons… the idea made her mouth dry up and her breath catch in her throat, and she wondered if camping in the forest was such a good idea.
    Pull yourself together, she told herself a second later. There’s no such thing as paranormal events. We’ve managed to disprove all of them so far.
    “Oh, and how could I forget?” the Sheriff continued. “We’ve also had reports of strange creatures in the woods with yellow or green eyes. Of course, they are probably just wolves or something similar. When a person is scared, their minds can play all sorts of tricks on them.”
    “Exactly,” said Craig, his tone calm and confident. “That’s what we aim to prove most of the time. Humans are completely irrational beings, and they are quick to jump to paranormal conclusions when there are perfectly reasonable explanations.”
    The Sheriff smiled and nodded, and while the group ate, they plotted out exactly where they would be camping on a map he had had pulled out of his pocket.
    “Okay, these spots here would be good,” the Sheriff said, marking crosses on the map. “This first spot is only a mile or so in, and we’ve had lots of reports of weird events around there. So you could stay there tonight, and then move on to….”
    He marked out another spot before continuing.
    “Over here. This is where the tourists apparently were before they disappeared.”
    Another shiver ran down Erin’s spine, but she dismissed it as Caitlin and Craig chatted excitedly. Neither of them seemed even remotely concerned, and Erin felt ridiculous for being so worried.
    After finishing up the talk with the Sheriff and his Deputy, the group headed back to their car and drove through the quaint old town before arriving on the edge of the forest, where they had been told they could park.
    “Everyone grab a bag, and then let’s head off,” Craig said.
    They trudged through the dense forest in silence for a while, being careful to follow the map that the Deputy had given them, and within an hour they were in the first camping spot, one mile into the forest.
    The Sheriff hadn’t been exaggerating about how eerily silent the woods were. Usually, there would be birds chirping and other sounds from forest-dwelling animals, but there was nothing; only the sounds of their footfall echoing through the area.
    Finally, they reached a clearing. A stream ran alongside where they set their tent up, and Cait lin looked over