"Are you sure this is the right place?" Leslie questions, glancing around in suspicion. It's currently 12:45 at night and they are standing at a bus stop. There's not a single sign of life around them, the forest across from them makes no noise and the road is empty on both sides. Earlier in the week Belle had accepted another mission, [Bus Number 6].
[A long time ago a bus was driving through the mountains with a few passengers. The driver of the bus was a depressed alcoholic whose wife recently divorced him. He was secretly drinking that night and in a fit of despair, he suddenly drove the bus off the cliff. Now, people say they can still see the bus late at night when nobody else is around. It is recommended never to get on bus number six if it appears at 1 a.m.; if you do, you may never reappear in the world of the living.]
The mission was pretty vague. It only told him to go to this spot and wait until the bus showed up at 1. So he called Leslie, and now they were waiting here. Their car was parked down the road, as there was nowhere else to park it in the area. They had already been waiting for about fifteen minutes and they still had fifteen to go when the sound of an engine startled them. They watched as a car slowly drove past the bus stop and into the distance.
"Weird, I didn't think anyone used this road," Belle mutters. A few minutes later, someone is walking up the path toward the bus stop. It's a girl with long brown hair tied up into low pigtails. She's wearing a black long-sleeved turtle neck dress with a rosary around her neck. She's carrying a large backpack and seems surprised to see them there.
"You two waiting for the bus?" She asks, stepping into the bus stop.
"Yeah, it should be coming any minute now," Belle replies as he checks the time, it reads 12:55.
"Hm, you should probably leave, this bus isn't safe." She advises.
"Do you know something about this bus?" Belle subtly asks. The girl seems to know more than she's let on; her presence here is already suspicious enough.
"Maybe, do you know something about this bus?" She fires back.
"Touche, we came here because we heard it's haunted, and I do live streams of haunted locations," Belle explains. If he got defensive, she would only suspect them of something worse.
"Sigh, look, I understand you do this for money and stuff, but this is an actual haunted location. You could die here if you aren't prepared." She says.
"Don't worry, I can assure you we're prepared." Leslie jumps in to assure her.
"I'm telling you, I don't want to have to protect you once we go in!" She's getting more annoyed as the conversation continues.
"I swear, we know what we're doing," Belle responds seriously. He feels a bit bad because she clearly doesn't want to see them in danger, but they had already done this before and knew what they were doing. Before she can say anything else the sound of an engine makes them turn to see a large bus driving down the road. It crawls to a stop in front of them and the doors open.
[Mission details: This bus is the place between reincarnation and the living world, each passenger has a regret they can't remember keeping them stuck on the bus in a loop. Help each passenger remember their regret before their stop or else they will get violent.]
[Passengers Helped: 0/10]
"Err." Belle makes a confused noise as he reads the text. This mission seems a bit more difficult than the ones before, no?
"Something wrong?" The girl asks.
"Nope, I'm going to start the stream now, are you okay with that?" He questions her.
"Nn, fine, since you're so quick to run to your death be my guest." She huffs, stepping onto the bus. Leslie follows her a beat later as Belle turns on the stream and does a quick introduction before climbing onto the bus. The inside is a lot more spacious than the outside made it seem. The bus driver doesn't ask for anything and simply closes the doors behind Belle. There are exactly ten passengers on the bus besides Belle, Leslie, and the girl. Speaking of the girl, she's sitting next to Leslie in the very back of the bus.
"Soooo, what's your name, mine is Leslie." As Belle approaches them he can hear Leslie introducing himself.
"...Avery." She replies.
"And my name is Belle, nice to meet you." He introduces. She stares up blankly at his outstretched hand, eventually ignoring it. Ouch.
"So, what's the plan?" Leslie eventually asks after an awkward beat of silence.
"It says we have to help all the spirits remember their regrets before their stop," Belle explains. He glances around at the ten people on the bus, some of them look normal, like their simply riding the bus home, but others have sunken faces, bloated bodies, or stab wounds.
"What are you talking about?" Avery questions, a look of annoyance on her face.
"Hm, just think of it like a mission," Belle vaguely tells her.
"Whatever." She sighs, looking away.
"What are you even doing here?" Leslie questions. She fixes him with a hard stare and he starts to sweat.
"U-uhm, I meant, why are you on this specific bus so late?" He tries again.
"It's my job, I'm an Exorcist and I've been tasked with investigating this bus as people have been going missing around the area because of it." She explains.
"Wait, you're an Exorcist? I've heard about them, what do you guys do? Do you have special abilities or anything?" Belle starts to ramble.
"Ugh, this is why I don't tell people about my job. Look, I'm not at leisure to discuss this with you." She says.
"Oh, sorry." He quickly apologizes, fiddling with his thumbs and staring at his feet. His excitement got the better of him, didn't he learn not to do that? As they sit there in silence trying to figure out what to do, the bus driver calls out that the next stop is fifteen minutes away. A passenger suddenly stands up and makes her way over to them. She appears to be a middle-aged woman with short brown hair, she has a knife in her stomach.
"Can I have some help?" She asks them.