Children of the Ark ✔️

Chapter Nine

(This chapter is dedicated to my best friend Zoe, the reason why is in the authors note at the bottom, but read the chapter first!!)

As we walked away from the smouldering shuttle that we had landed in, we felt peace. We were officially on Earth and we were going to survive. Who knows if we were going to go back onto the Ark, if we were going to join a Clan or if we were going to die on Earth.

Sunlight filtering through the leaves, the whispering sounds of the wind passing through the leaves, the crunch of leaves and branches under our boots, the vibrant colours of everything made us feel alive. I could not seem to stop smiling. Completely forgetting that we have to survive down here. Completely forgetting that the Clans are at war. Completely forgetting that Jacob was out to kill me.

Everything down here on Earth is so much better than it is on the Ark. The twisting trees and the vibrant colours are much better compared to the dull, grey metal walls of the Ark. I could tell that the others were all in happy moods by the way they are walking, or by the way that they are all talking to each other.

I don't need to be apart of their conversation. I like zoning out and looking at everything that I had always wished that I never would see when I was on the Ark, but since I'm here, why not enjoy it?

We had been walking for a few hours and we were all getting exhausted. We have never had to walk this far or for this long before so it didn't take us long before we all needed to stop. We all decide to take out our stuff so that we can see what we all have.

All together, we have 21 days worth of food (3 days for 7 people), 7 metres of rope, 5 pocketknives, 3 medium sized first aid kits, 1 large first aid kit, 7 packets of matches, 4 packets of fire starters, 4 vials of water purifier, 4 flashlights and 24 batteries. We were all smart enough to get 3 days worth of food and water in our packs.

As we were all putting our stuff back into our bags, I noticed a small pocket on the inside. I opened it up and saw that my roots and berries booklet was in there, and another piece of paper that seems to be a map of the area where we landed.

"Hey guys, did you get maps as well?" I ask them. They all search through their packs and bring out their own maps.

"So does anyone know where we are?" Uriah asks.

"Well that small red circle shows where we landed, but I had no idea which way we went off in." I reply.

"Does anyone know how to figure out what way we went?" Uriah asks.

"Well if we can find out where the sun is, I can probably find out where north is." Jett says.

"I think it's in that direction." I say pointing to my left.

"Okay, well, I think all I have to do it use my watch and point the hour hand towards the sun," he says taking off his watch. "then in between the sun and the 12 should be north. So it is in that direction." He points a little to the left of the direction we had just come from.

"So that means that we are basically going south." I quickly check the map to see what we are walking towards. "Okay, we are going away from the major Clans, which is a good thing, but we are walking towards denser forest."

"I don't think that may people would have gone this way, they would have gone towards the Clans." Uriah says.

"Maybe those people that were affected by the radiation have been hiding here. There don't seem to be any Clans over here." Jett points out.

"Yeah, they might be territorial." Amelia says.

"Or, it's just a bad place to start a Clan with the thick trees and all." Uriah argues.