Dismantling The Box of Grief and Venge

Chapter 18: Making Peace with The Past Memory of Him

They ran to the berth where Ezra was already there with their backpacks ready. Once he saw them, he threw their backpack to each owner respectively. "If you don't feel comfortable fighting above the water, watch over us on the ship's bridge and use your arrows instead," he handed her her bow and arrows, then they left immediately to the deck. In the deck, there were already five intruders. They still didn't understand where they were coming from. Ahmya went up to the ship's bridge which had the best view among every part of the ship. From there she noticed another boat following behind them.

The boat was bigger and moved faster than theirs. People were dropping off the boat, using a type of device that pushed them towards the boat. Ahmya aimed for those people to prevent them from reaching their ship, but she was hesitating. "What is it, Ahmya?" Soni asked her while fighting below her.

"They're more people reaching fast towards us from the water," she said.

"Slow them down! Shoot them!" Soni shouted.

"What if I kill them?" Of course she wasn't prepared to kill anyone even though she was considered to be on a battlefield. The farthest she had thought about was knocking down their enemies. She could have just aimed for their feet, hands, or the device they're using to slow them down, but the problem was that they're in the water which she barely could see but their silhouettes. She worried that she might miss her shot and killed them. At this point, she realized that she wasn't ready for this.

"Ahmya, they're hunting us, probably they don't mind killing us too," Soni said. She saw more invaders coming up their boat, then she aimed for their non-fatal body parts, making them fall back off the boat, but then she accidentally shot right on a person's chest and of course, he died in an instant. "No!" She screamed hysterically. Someone reached up to her position and punched her and she fell on the bridge. She couldn't really compose herself well as she was still feeling the panic. He grabbed her by her collar but she quickly maneuvered to fight back.

After a while, the man dominated the fight. She lost the grab of her bow and it fell off the bridge to the deck below, while the man managed to grab one of her arrows to be used against her. She kicked his ball so he flinched and she rolled up and punched him several times. Suddenly another man grabbed her from behind by her neck as the man she previously punched pointed her arrow towards her. Ahmya jumped and raised her foot to kick on the man. The man fell back, but the momentum also caused her and the man holding her to fall off the bridge. With the hit by her elbow, the man flinched, but he still kept a tight hold on her that she almost choked.

Ezra noticed Ahmya was no longer on the bridge, her bow laid down on the deck, so he picked it up. He climbed up the bridge to find her, but he only found a fainted man with her arrow in his hand and he took the arrow. He quickly scanned his surroundings and found her choked on the edge of the boat. He aimed at the man and his arrow hit right on his sleeve. The man was shocked as he felt the pain. Ahmya took advantage to slip off and punched the man off the boat.

Ezra quickly jumped off the bridge and handed her bow to her. "See? They don't mind killing us, Ahmya." Ahmya only looked at him briefly before returning to their fight. She embraced herself as she tried to aim for more men that were approaching, telling herself that it's for her own defense, even though her heart was still hard to accept it reasonably. Maybe this was the cruelty on the battlefield that she needed to tolerate.

***

"They break the speed boat too," Soni said as he walked up to his father. Even though they had knocked down all the men on the boat, there were still more men approaching. If they had to wait until they're all knocked down, they would lose much time. 

"Gather up!" Finn commanded and they're reaching up towards him. "Collect their swimming devices. We'll swim to the shore," he said. They all did as they're told and they also collected her remaining arrows that fell on the deck along the way. As she was wearing the device that looked like a backpack that was placed on her chest, she contemplated. She was scared of the ocean. How could she swim across the water to the shore that was still around a mile away from them? She probably would lag behind after just a few meters.