Wings

Protected(1/2)

"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans"
—John Lennon

She woke against the tree. Georgia Pine as far as the eye could see, the sun barely visible in the sky. She hardly remembered falling asleep, but she remembers the knife, clutched loosely in her fist. "Burning daylight," she thought, "how long was I out?" It couldn't have been long but she had no way of knowing anymore. As she rose, pulling her green utility jacket from around her shoulders, she wondered that she could still appreciate so much beauty. "Thank God for that" she said only to herself, and then gave a small smile.

She made her way to the creek, refilling her old Stanley thermos. The thing was heavy but it did the job. She hoped the strap would hold out. It tickled her to think that it could be used as a weapon in a pinch. The thought was delightfully unsettling. But this was the world now. Checking that she had everything in her old worn out ruck, she set off, heading north.

She hadn't gone very far when she heard a low growl. One she recognized all too well. Pulling her large Bowie knife from its sheath, she waited. It was slow, but big. The smell was enough to gag a maggot. The idea was to knock it to the ground with her boot and dispatch it quickly, but life had other ideas.

She never noticed the crawler. As she swung her knife at the temple of the monster in front of her, she felt a tight grip around her ankle. All at once her feet were yanked from under her. She kicked frantically to no avail. The large creature was on top of her quickly, teeth gnashing at her face. With a hard kick, the crawler on her ankle was silenced, but though she tried, she couldn't get to her knife, knocked from her grip by the fall. Placing her forearm on the neck of the thing, she struggled, but she was swiftly losing the battle. Death had done nothing much to lighten this one. With another failed attempt to push the beast off, she felt a calm come over her. "So this is it? Peace at last?", she wondered. All at once she started to lean into it. The forest became completely quiet around her. Looking up at the sun filtering through the trees, the nearly 30 year old thought in that moment how tired she felt. She was almost giddy with the prospect of going Home.

Reality broke in as her attention wandered once again to the vicious maw, inching closer with every second. She knew it was important to silence her screams, keep quiet so as not to draw more of the things, but at that moment, all she could think is that she wasn't quite ready to give in. Not quite ready to go quietly into that good night. "NOT YET!!", she screamed, her cry echoing through the forest. Her free arm had almost reached her knife when suddenly the thing was limp on top of her.