The Wilderness

Chapter Six

The eight remaining kids continued their journey in search of the city, but they had all but lost hope of ever finding it. Chris was determined not to fail his group, not so much from compassion tho as pride.

​I'm never wrong, I never am, Chris encouraged himself. I'll find that city if it kills me.

​"Ally?" Sky said suddenly after a long period of quietness.

​"Yeah?"

​"I'm hungry."

​"Me too."

​"If I was home, I would be eating waffles with syrup all over them."

​"That sounds good..."

​"A juicy steak sounds pretty good 'bout now," Jason joined the conversation.

​"I'm feeling like more of a Big Mac," Jackson added.

​"Can we stop talking about food?" Lola snapped.

​"'Can we stop talking about food? I don't ever eat anything so I'm jealous that everyone else does'," Jason did a mockery of Lola, and Jackson, Sky, Ally, and Alex started laughing.

​"Stop laughing!" Lola complained, "I do eat!"

​"Yeah Jason!" Jackson said as he stood beside Lola. "Lola does eat! Everyday she eats her homework so that she doesn't have to do it!" Another torrent of laughter.

​"You're so mean!" Lola whined at Jackson. She stomped away to Chris, who had listened to the conversation with a grin on his face. "Why don't you say something?" Lola asked him, obviously annoyed.

​"Okay than," Chris said to her before turning to the group, "Guys, stop bothering Lola...it's so much nicer not having to hear her voice." The kids, excluding Lola and Stephan, start laughing all over again. Lola let out a frustrated sigh and walked ahead of the group. Eventually, once their laughter had died down, they continued on after her.

The kids had stopped at the edge of a river. It was around fifty or so feet across, and the water was moving at a fairly fast pace. The kids didn't have to feel the water to know it was freezing.

​"What do we do now Mr. Waldren?" Jason asked. Chris was walking up and down alongside the water, trying to figure out just that.

I don't remember this, Chris thought as he remembered first seeing the city, there wasn't any river near the city. Are we going the wrong way? No, of course we're not. I just must've missed it.

Chris thought for a moment longer before replying. "We'll have to cross it."

"Are you crazy?!" Jason exclaimed. "We can't cross that thing! We'll freeze to death!"

"Not if you cross it quickly," Chris replied, "If you do your body will heat up."

"Whatever, I'm not crossing. If you wanna freeze to death than fine, but I'm not crossing," Jason decided. Chris looked at the others to see who else wasn't going to come. None of them looked all that eager, but he was sure that once he jumped in they would follow.

"Okay than, we'll just go without you," Chris told Jason.

"Chris, I don't think this is a good idea," Stephan spoke up for the first time since that morning.

"Finally decided to talk again huh?" Chris said rather harshly. "We need to cross over, that's the way to the city. Unless you'd rather we stay here and eat berries." Stephan opened his mouth to speak, but closed it. Chris' sharp words had cut him deep, and he couldn't find the courage to say anything. Chris gave him a curt nod, as though telling him he was smart to not have spoken.