Journey to Hope: Free Reads

Treehouse

Another English prompt. TW - fear, heights))

Salty was stranded very far from the Paradise Place now. She had no idea what the beyond woods were like. Dragging her paws through the tall grass, she looked around, only to see trees, spiky bushes, and acorns littered all over the forest floor.

Suddenly, Salty heard something. It sounded like prey. She sniffed the grass, and it was indeed a prey animal. She hadn't eaten all day, so she was very hungry. Nobody ever went hungry in the Paradise Place- not even in winter. She crouched. Once she inched closer to the rustling sound, she leaped up in the air, and a chipmunk started scuttling off.

"Oh no you dont!" Salty shouted before chasing the chipmunk. Her Sun-pack genes consisted of long legs and a thin body, so running was something she was good at. She chased the chipmunk for a while, before it started to climb a tree. Salty came to a quick halt. She was panting, out of breath. She almost wanted to give up, but her growling belly said no.

She dug her shiny, black claws into the tree bark. She pushed her hind legs off of the bottom of the trunk, leaping onto a branch. She kept climbing higher and higher, until she almost slipped off of a branch. She looked down- the ground was farther away than she thought. She made a loud squeak in fear, as her back legs dangled off of the large branch. She pulled her long body up with her front paws, and squirmed back up on the branch.She kicked her back legs against the branch until she was leaning on the trunk. She held onto the tree for balance. She had almost forgotten she was after a chipmunk. She looked up, and not far up into the tree, there was a strange looking branch. Upon closer observation, it looked like a Tallstander Shelter. The shelter was made out of wood. Maybe the chipmunk is in there, it looks cozy, she thought. She climbed up onto another branch, and then another, and struggled to climb up into the shelter, but she made it up there. She looked around the shelter, and the chipmunk was in a corner, dozed off. Salty crept closer, but the chipmunk heard her. It shot up, and dashed off.

"Come back here, lunch!" Salty shouted. She chased after the chipmunk, and it almost flew into the air, on the edge of the shelter, before Salty hit it with her paw, and the chipmunk flew back into the shelter. She turned around and nipped its neck. The prey died instantly. But Salty's back paws slid off the edge of the shelter as she screeched in shock and fear.

Her back legs dangled off of the shelter, and she struggled to pull herself up. Her claws were slipping. Brightfields, I'm not ready yet, she silently prayed in her head.

There was a small branch under her right back paw. She pushed down on that branch with her paw, and got her right paw back up into the shelter. She struggled to pull her other leg up, but she managed. She picked up her meal, took it to the corner, and quietly ate her meal before falling asleep.

The next morning, Salty woke up to some chattering. She couldn't quite understand what they were saying, but they didn't sound like mongooses. She looked up, and she heard someone climbing the tree. Suddenly, she saw a tallstander. She cowered in the corner.

"Hello!" The tallstander said.

Salty could somehow understand the tallstander. "Hi...?" She whispered, but the tallstander just heard chatters.

"Look, Jamie! There's a weasel in the treehouse!" The tallstander shouted. Salty didn't understand what the young tallstander said, but she had a bad feeling about it.

The tallstander tried to grab Salty, but she hissed. The tallstander made a calm expression, and Salty relaxed her body. A... nice tallstander?

The tallstander grabbed her gently, climbed down the tree, and set her on the ground.

"There, you can go home now," The tallstander said.

Salty did understand that, somehow. She ran into the bushes. Home. She wanted to go home, but she needed to find it first. She continued her long trip through the woods to find it.

Mongoose terms

Tallstander - human

Shelter - den, house