The day Ari ran into Jared in the woods, his life changed drastically. Well, at least he thought. Going from a small, desolate anguis village to running through the woods in a life or death situation tended to be quite jarring.

That same day, Jared had written in his morning journal that he had slept in late and needed to quickly get a present for one of the elder anguis' birthdays. He was then planning on writing in his pre-lunch journal that he had already gathered the flowers and was preparing the vase for them, but instead he wrote in his adventure journal, ahhhhhHahahahahahhHAhhHAHHH.

One may have asked why Jared Jogle kept so many journals. The reason, in fact, was preparation for exactly what happened. Jared had always been a daydreamer, and had been quite disciplined for it. Because of this he decided that instead of coming up with a story to dream about, he might as well wait for real adventure to come about him. This plan seemed very foolish to those viewing into Jared's little bubble, but he was certain of the fact that something would happen one day.

So Jared started the journals as a way to look back on how and why he had gotten himself into any sort of situation. He had a morning journal, a pre-lunch journal, a post-lunch journal, a midafternoon snack journal, a post dinner journal, a midnight journal, and, of course, an adventure journal. All eight of these journals had their own special significance and purposes to Jared's life.

On the most important day of Jared's life, though (excluding his birth), he messed up. If one were to just read his morning journal entry and then his adventure entry, they wouldn't know what to think. But if they were to then look at his next adventure journal entry it started to make more sense as to what was happening. Because of the next entry, Bird girl and friends are going on an adventure, one could say with near 100% certainty that Jared was most likely running from an angry mob of humans trying to kill him and his newfound friends.

And of course, Jared loved every second of it.

Jared felt the adrenaline rush pumping through his scaly body as he ran with his friends from the strangers. (He presumed. Nobody had actually told Jared what was happening. He had only assumed when everyone started to seem really angry at them that speeding away was probably the best course of action.) He started to slow down, realizing that they had lost Ari's faber friend, Kei, and the other anguis, Aidyn. He and Ari come to a near complete stop, just to almost be trampled by the other two. (Kei looked like she had eaten too many wild mushrooms.)

The four slowly regained their composure without saying a word. Jared looked to Ari, Ari looked to Kei, Kei looked to Aidyn, and Aidyn looked back at the new guy. There was a tense peacefulness surrounding their staring circle. A silence so thick and foggy that it seemed like nothing could break it.

Well, that was the case until Jared started screaming.

It was a nice hearty scream. The kind of scream one would let out after taking the best crap of their life, or climbing to the top of a massive mountain just to hang-glide back to sea level in the middle of a snow storm. One that was so disruptive and unexpected that the trees and surrounding beings' very essence quaked from it. That was the kind of scream Jared screamed. After so long of waiting in his village, he was leaving for adventure, real adventure. Not some crummy old petty crime, or run in the woods, real adventure.

Jared's exuberant enthusiasm was not a shared emotion with his acquaintances. In fact, it seemed the others were feeling quite the opposite: completely out of breath, exhausted from their impromptu run. This did not stop Jared from continuing to scream, which caused Ari to take notice of their new friend's current condition. She stared for a few moments, before taking in a deep breath and started to belt out a scream from herself. To this, Jared only got more excited, for he did not know what Ari was screaming about. So he lifted his arms above his ahead, and began to run around in a circle, Ari soon following suit.

Kei was then somehow awakened from her dazed state, and seemed almost surprised to see Ari and Jared running around in a circle screaming. She looked between the two of them, then over to a very worn-out Aidyn, then back to the other two again. She followed by glancing down to her hands and slowly lifting them above her head. A loud scream was released from her lungs, and she joined the now-trio of weirdos.

Lastly, poor Aidyn was brought back to his senses a bit too quickly. He opened his eyes to find the rest of his party screaming bloody murder while running around in circles. He sighed softly, realizing it would definitely take too much effort to quiet them down.

"Six tides," he lightly mumbled as he stood up. He took in a massive breath before lifting his hands above his head. "What has my life come to?" Jared thought he heard the other anguis murmur, before Aidyn apparently gave up on all semblance of sanity and joined in on the festivities.

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After what felt like hours of hoarse screaming, everyone had somewhat calmed down. (Well, at least Jared had.) One by one, they laid down in the leaves on the ground.

When Jared looked around, he saw massive, beautiful green trees with a thick log and high-up branches. He saw beautiful blue skies and some sort of fowl flying above them. He heard the rushing sound of a small creek from a bit away. He smelled the stickiness of some pollen still in the air. He sensed the full surrealness that he just ran away from a bunch of angry scary people with some teens who he had never met or seen before. But that only made it better, knowing that what you were doing was recklessness and unnecessary.

Knowing that even if your way was more challenging, it would be way more fun than anything else.

Jared stared up at the sky in a daze. Everyone else had already woken from the incident earlier and stood around his body. He laid there, motionless.

Kei kicked him in the shoulder.

No response.

Ari shook him lightly.

No response.

Aidyn splashed some water on Jared's face.

A silence settled as Ari looked, horrified, at the now-empty water container. Kei appeared jealous, due to the fact that she hadn't come up with it herself, and Aidyn looked bored and tired from their over-welcomed stay at the village earlier.

And Jared, well, Jared was awake now, and very very wet.

He looked up at the three friends standing around him. Ari appeared to have gone into some sort of mini panic attack, hands clutched over her head. Next to her, Kei looked very unamused about the whole situation. Then of course, Aidyn put the container down. He smiled slightly and reached his hand down to help Jared up.

Jared took the help and stood with the others in the circle they had formed. "Well that was fun," he said casually, looking at his companions.

"FUN!!!!!!!!!!" Ari screamed, hysterical. "YOU THOUGHT THAT WAS FUN?!!!!!!!!!!"

"Well, yeah," responded Jared, "we outran all of those guys and I don't even have feet."

The group took a moment to reflect on this fact. Aidyn was the first to open his mouth. "Well he's not wrong — "

This was then cut short by another scream from Ari. The others vaguely interpreted the high-pitched sound coming from her mouth as, "WE COULD HAVE DIED THOUGH!!!!!!!!"

"And what's so bad about that?" Jared responded sarcastically.

Kei sighed and Aidyn just smiled. Ari steamed. "EVERYTHING JARED, THE MAIN POINT OF GETTING OUT THERE ALIVE WAS THE 'US BEING ALIVE' PART!"

Jared laughed at this, having never heard something more obviously stated. "Well of course, silly," Jared grinned, "but we could still have some fun with it."

Ari groaned, realizing she was fighting a losing battle. She turned back towards Kei and Aidyn — both of whom had stayed painfully quiet — and shifted topics, starting to feel tired from all of the excitement earlier. "We should probably set up camp for the night, it's getting kind of late."

The others nodded. Jared did not. "How are we supposed to sleep?" he asked, a little concerned.

"Umm," Aidyn said, noticing the lack of supplies they had.

Kei laughed. "Well you guys can cuddle or something cause I got a sleeping bag." She made a 'L' with her hand and put it on her forehead.

"We could make a fire or something to stay warm," suggested Aidyn, who seemed to be very against the idea of cuddling with the other two.

"I don't know, Aidyn," Jared says, "cuddling doesn't sound that bad."

Aidyn snorted and turned away. "I'm getting wood. If anyone wants to come, feel free."

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After nearly an hour of back and forth between the group, they decided a fire would be the best course of action.

Reaching this point was no easy task for any of them. Aidyn and Ari were for the fire, to stay warm. Kei didn't want the fire because she didn't need it. And Jared was arguing against all three of them for the sake of arguing. It didn't take long for Kei to see what Jared was doing, and was quick to jump onto his boat to annoy the other two.

Neither Jared or Kei knew exactly what they were advocating for. Which was very apparent in some of the 'points' they made. A few being that snakes don't like fires, fires are scary in the dark, they smell weird, and what if it catches us on fire.

The argument may have lasted a bit too long because by the end it was already very dark out. "Well, we've got to figure something out," said a frustrated Aidyn.

Jared dealt the final blow. "I guess we could make a fire if you really wanted to."

Aidyn fumed. He then turned around to find that Ari was no longer standing behind him. He looked a bit farther ahead and saw some smoke.

"Look over there," Aidyn said as he pointed into the distance.

Jared squinted his eyes. "What? I don't see anything," he replied.

Now even more frustrated, Aidyn responded, "Well, come on. It's this way."

Aidyn marched off, Jared in slow pursuit. They walked a short distance to the fire, only to find Ari and Kei already there. Aidyn walked into the light and sat down, while Jared stayed back, secretly slithering inside of one of the bushes. The three friends near the fire made little to no small talk before Kei brought up that they should tell scary stories.

"I don't know if I have the energy for that," said Aidyn as he shook his head in disagreement. "I'll sit and listen though."

Aidyn glanced over to Ari, Jared sensing a bit of troubled curiosity in his gaze. The caela's face remained stoic, so he looked back at Kei, who was staring at him dead-on.

For some inexplicable reason, this nonverbal communication caused Aidyn to change his mind. "I guess we could tell some stories if you really want to."

Kei nodded her head eagerly at this and beckoned him over to some of the logs they'd laid on the ground. "Yay! Who's up first?" she asked.

Ari stayed silent and Aidyn leaned back into the log he was sitting on.

"You guys are practically radiating enthusiasm right now," Kei grumbled. She frowned when neither smiled. "I guess I'll go," she sighed.

Ari straightened into a stiff posture, looking into the darkness beyond and making direct eye contact with Jared.

Jared looked in from outside the light of the fire as Kei eerily smiled to begin her story. He tried to hear her whispered words as she started but was too busy attempting to climb the tree right behind Aidyn. The idea they were going for was when Kei was at the peak of her story, Jared was going to drop out of the tree right behind Aidyn for a jump-scare. Jared and Kei had worked it out earlier when they were arguing about the fire with the other two.

The two biggest problems with this plan were as followed: getting Ari to agree with a prank was going to be near impossible, and how was Jared going to get away from Aidyn before the scare? Both of these things did work out in the end, with Ari agreeing very reluctantly and just making sure Aidyn was distracted.

But very soon, a new problem emerged: how Jared was going to climb the tree.

Now, don't underestimate Jared's ability or anything, he could climb trees. As most anthropomorphic snakes would do, he silently, slowly slid up the tree. So slow in fact that Kei had to slow down her story telling when she noticed Jared hadn't given the ready signal yet. He continued to struggle and wriggle himself to the branch right above Aidyn. He let out a soft owl sound and Kei noticed. There was no going back now.

Alas, this is where one last problem arose. If Jared was on the branch right above Aidyn, how would Jared get off said tree to be behind Aidyn?

This was the last thought that passed through Jared's head before he toppled out of the tree.

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Oof.

Thank you for reading Chapter 17 — and congratulations to Jared's writer on their first chapter! We hope you like Jared so far. Jared and his journals are dogtier.

(Thank you also to the excellent Charles (mushroom-boi), who it was later revealed writes Jared's chapters. I c o n i c.)

Also, if you celebrate Hanukkah (such as I, Ref) then happy Hanukkah! If you do not celebrate Hanukkah (such as everyone else in the collab) then happy... weekend! Actually happy weekend to everyone involved, regardless of what they celebrate. Weekends don't discriminate.

With virtual hugs, possible new Google characters, and gay snake bois with no feet,

Gross Fucking Cat

(G.F.C.)