The Portal Effect

Chapter 7

I was woken suddenly by the sound of crashing trees. I stood up and looked around, the others also getting up and looking for the source of the sound. We all gathered up by the railing, looking at the tree line.

"Where's Leo?" I asked suddenly, realizing Leo was not with us. Jessie paled.

"We were doing watch, and he said he had to take a quick leak." she said weakly.

"And you let him go alone!" James growled. A sudden cry from the trees met our ears. Leo broke through the trees and sprinted to the tower, close behind him a bear. When the bear saw him climb the stairs, it stopped. Looking at the tower cautiously, it huffed and paced.

"What did you do to piss off a grizzly?" John asked.

"I was just relieving myself. Didn't even know it was there until it growled." Leo panted. He seemed unharmed, save for a twig scratch on his arm.

The bear paced for a bit longer before turning away and ambling back into the forest. We all laughed as Leo spit at the retreating animal.

"Did there happen to be a beehive nearby?" Jessie inquired. She looked at the trees nearby, trying to spot one.

"I didn't bother to look. I was focused on peeing." Leo snapped. He grumbled something about bears and bees as he walked into the tower.

"Well, at least there's something other than rift creatures in the forest." Nick pointed out. Even Leo had to smile at Nick's jab at a joke.

"Speaking of these creatures, we need to give them names. I saw two different sized and shaped creatures in the lab." Andy Collins said thoughtfully. Sarge scoffed, but said nothing. I smiled.

"Well, the smaller ones could be Breachers." I offered.

"Why 'Breacher'" Sarge asked.

"Well, something has to go through first to make sure none of the others die, and they had more present. Smaller and faster." I shrugged. "They might also act as scouts."

"Ok, ok. I see it." he nodded. The others agreed with the name. I smiled.

"What about the bigger one? We have to assume there are more classes, probably larger ones as well." James asked. For the next few minutes, we discussed.

The names that came up were Rift Beast, Rift Runner, and Hunter. "What shall we decide on?" Andy asked when we had stopped talking.

"I think Hunter for me." Leo said. "They are the ones that are coming after us, and seem to be doing a good job of finding and scaring us."

"I agree." James said, putting up his hand. The rest of us put our hands up in agreement.

"That settles it. First class is Breacher, and second class is Hunter." Andvari said, miming a judge hitting the block to settle a debate.

Cody had told us the jet would arrive by noon today, and currently it was just after eleven. I, along with Sarge and James, went hunting for a last meal in the forest. We didn't have enough food for all of us. And a last meal in the woods felt like an insult to the forest for its seemingly intentional need to kill us.

Soon the meal was cooking and we waited patiently but hungrily. We had caught a few bunnies and a duck, as well as two squirrels. So not much between ten full grown people, but still enough to at the least satiate hunger. We'd get a full meal once we were back.

Finally, it was noon, and we created a large fire ring. The smoke wafted up in a large dark grey plum. Every few minutes, we added some leaves and wet branches. And for the next half hour we waited in tense silence, straining our ears past the sound of the fire and the animals in the forest.