Ship Falling

Chapter 8

The hunt was winding down. It was now almost lunchtime, and Mary, Oliver, and Ted had made it back to their hangout house. "Man, what a day, right?" Oliver said and took a swig of his soda like he was drinking beer. Mary and Ted both muttered their agreements. Walking for almost 3 hours had taken a toll on their feet. After a few minutes of comfortable silence, Mary spoke up. "Hey, have you guys seen Kath and Anya? Last I heard from them, they were good, but that was an hour ago." They all took out their phones hurriedly. No one had texted the group chat since Mary sent out a text that read Me, Oli and Ted are together. You guys aren't going to believe what we found. It hadn't been read. Mary called Kath, then remembered Anya told her Kath's phone had died. She quickly switched contacts and called Anya. After the first ring, she picked up. "Mary! Thank god. I kept trying to call you but it wasn't going through." Apparently Katherine was the one using Anya's phone. "Kath, are you alright? Where's Anya?" Her voice was shaky. "Me and Anya are in a cave somewhere on the outskirts of the forest. Something- I mean, the only thing it could be was a bear, it ran at us. We dove into here to hide out. We have no idea if it's still looking for us." "Alright, hand the phone to Anya, Kath." A shuffling sound came as Kath passed her phone to Anya. "Hey, it's me. Use the GPS on your phone to track Kath's. We have enough food to last us until tonight." "Alright, hang in there, guys, we're coming to get you. Try to keep Katherine calm, if she has an anxiety attack it might make too much noise." Anya grunted in response then hung up. Oliver jumped up and put on his backpack. "Looks like a deer rescue mission's turned into a human rescue mission." Stealthily, Ted loaded the BB gun he'd secretly brought along. If there was actually a bear in these woods, they'd need some kind of protection. Neither of the others noticed the gun.

Using Mary's tracking app, They were slowly but steadily heading towards the cave where the girls were hiding out. At least, they were heading towards where Katherine's phone was. By then, the group had gotten into the hang of stopping to eat every hour or so, and drinking water every once in a while. Mary thought back to the day before. If she'd talked about anything else besides the injured deer, they wouldn't even be in the woods right now. She felt a little guilty for letting things get so out of hand. Eventually, the cave came into sight. Ted opened his phone and started texting, presumably in the group chat to let the girls know they'd been found. A couple seconds later, Katherine shot out from the cave and ran towards them, arms open wide. She hugged Mary tightly. "You found us! I can't believe you found us!" Mary patted her on the back. "Yeah, yeah. Did you think we were just gonna leave you stranded?" Anya had come out too, and was walking at a slower pace. She gave Mary and the others a less enthusiastic hug, then turned on her heel and started walking in the direction of the cabin. "Now, let's get out of here. I'm tired of listening to Kath's whining." Katherine shot her a side-eyed look, but Anya was already 2 steps ahead of everyone and didn't see it. After a final long and treacherous walk back to the cabin, everyone sat down exhausted in their chairs. "Well, we didn't find the deer, but we found a lake. I'd say that's pretty achievement-ish." Mary smirked sarcastically and mumbled, "We found a monster, though." Ted heard her. "Yeah, there must be a reason those birds were flying so frantically." Anya sat up and spoke as well. "That thing we saw... it was hidden in the bushes, but it didn't have fur or claws. It had... skin. Slimy skin. Like a lizard." Kath looked thoughtful for a moment. "Come to think of it, the only person who didn't have a weird experience today was... you, Oliver." Everyone looked at him with a hint of suspicion. "What? You think I was the one doing this? Since when can I make birds defy gravity or change my skin texture to slimy? I discovered a whole lake, damn it! That's pretty weird, if you ask me." The others weren't convinced. "Look, I only went on this trip because everyone else was going, but that doesn't mean I wanted to sabotage it! We covered almost the whole forest, didn't we? If the deer isn't in these woods, it's not anywhere as far as i'm concerned." Anya looked away for a moment. "Not anywhere? What do you mean by that?" He gave her a you're-dumb look. "Like, maybe someone put it out of its misery and had a nice deer-meat sandwich that day." Mary's head-gears started to turn. "Well, I don't know anyone in our town that hunts for sport, plus everyone just eats chicken and steak here. So the question is, who ate the deer?" Everyone was quiet for a moment. Oliver looked around at the others with a tired expression. "Who even cares? We've eaten all the food, drank all the water, and discovered a lake. What happened to a deer doesn't matter. Besides, we have school tomorrow. Staying up thinking about this won't solve anything," Oliver said, side eyeing Katherine. Everyone knew when she had stayed up late overthinking, because her skin was sensitive and the bags under her eyes were always prominent. Mary sighed and started gathering her things. "I guess you're right. Come on guys, I left a note for my dad but he's probably still worried about me. Let's head back. Everyone started putting empty bags and scattered soda cans into their backpacks. They left in single file (The door wasn't big enough for 2 people to go through at once) then walked back. Mary and Katherine were at the front walking side by side, followed by Anya and Ted and at the back alone was Oliver. They trudged through the woods for about 15 minutes before reaching the entrance to the forest. Mary all but ran to her house, while Ted walked slower to his house next door. Anya had the longest way to go from the forest, her house was a few streets away. Everyone had settled down and said their goodbyes before leaving.