A World Found--Book 1

Chapter 8

They both looked one more time at the shuttle before turning and walking away. They headed north, the grass turned a bright blue color the further that they walked. Zoe wrote down everything they saw in her little blue notebook.

The sun rose steadily as they journeyed further from the shuttle. They walked past trees that had glowing pink fruit, and passed a fat animal that waddled past them, it had six legs, and a long nose, it reminded Freya of an ant eater, but white.

 Zoe shut her notebook and slid it into her back pocket. "It would be a lovely planet if there wasn't such a deadly creature living here." Freya agreed.

 After an hour or two of walking they climbed onto a large tree, it had glowing white leaves. It looked like diamonds. They ate their freezer dried meal in silence. Had it only been a week since Keith and Kats deaths? 

Had it only been a week since they arrived here? Freya took a small sip of water from her canteen. They would survive, both of them. She had made up her mind, and when she made up her mind well it was good as done. 

Zoe giggled and pointed at the tree next to them. A small monkey-like creature stared at them with the largest eyes Freya had ever seen. She didn't know how Zoe found it cute, quite frankly she found it creepy.

 The creature gave a low 'meow' and leapt over to their tree. It looked like a monkey and cat combined. Zoe held out her hand and clucked her tongue. "Don't be scared little guy." Freya gave Zoe a warning look. 

"Zoe, be careful." The creature jumped into Zoes' lap, grabbed her face with its hands and started to lick her face. "Haha, stop it tickles!" Zoe laughed and patted the creature's head. "I dub thee Monkin, like monkey and kitten." Freya raised an eyebrow. Monkin?

 Zoe reached into her back pocket and started to sketch the animal. Its fur was a stunning blue, like grass and like Zoes eyes. Its dark eyes looked up at Freya. It meowed and jumped onto her head. 

Freya grumbled as it ran its hand through her long dark hair. "Zoe, get it off me." Zoe giggled and pulled the creature off. Freya looked down at her nonbroken watch. "You sleep, I'll watch. You have four hours then I'll sleep, okay?" Zoe yawned. "Yeah, sounds good."

Zoe fell asleep with the Monkin in her arms, they both slept quietly. Freya leaned against the trunk of the tree and looked out of the wide prairie of blue grass. If the Algras ever made it to earth, they would take one look at green grass and green trees and laugh.

 Everything was the same color down on earth, but here everything was vivid. A howl echoed through the forest of trees and Freya shivered. Something touched her arm, and she jumped spinning around. 

The Monkin tugged at her sleeve, 'meow' it climbed into her arms and snuggled into her. Freya shivered and leaned back against the tree. "Don't do that, I could have killed you." she grumbled. 

The sun glared down at Freya, and she pulled her hood over her head, she suddenly felt very tired. Four hours passed but Freya couldn't make herself wake the girl. She had been through a lot. Why had she come on the mission anyway? She feared her own shadow. 

Finally, after five hours Freya woke Zoe and let herself get sleep. When she woke up Zoe was whispering to Monkin. "I won't be able to take you home with me, so you'll have to stay here, try not to miss us too much." 

Freya looked down at her watch. "Zoe! You let me sleep for five hours!? I said three!" Zoe looked behind her "You let me sleep for five, don't think I didn't notice." Freya sighed.

 "We have to go, we only have a few hours before the sun set, time is different here." Freya leapt from the tree. "Toss me my rifle."

They trekked through the blue grass for over an hour before Zoe needed rest. They ate breakfast sitting under another white tree. The Monkin had followed them to Freyas surprise. 

Zoe tossed it chunks of her freezer dried food. "Zoe! It can get its own food! We'll starve before it does." Zoe turned a bright red and stopped feeding it. "So, what are we looking for?" Zoe asked.

 Freya shoved the rest of the freezer dried food back into her bag. "A cave maybe, somewhere we can hide till we get help from earth, they should be able to track us."

They kept walking north, and after nearly two hours they found what they were looking for. A huge crater with a hole in the side, perfect, they could see their enemies from all sides. 

They collapsed on the floor of the small cave and cried with joy. The Monkin sniffed around the floor then choosing a spot settled down and fell asleep.

They set up a fire at the edge of the small cave and sat around it, watching the stars start to appear in the sky. "I miss home." Freya looked over at Zoe "I know, but we'll make it back." Zoe looked over at her gratefully. 

"Yeah, you know my baby brother is due in a week. I was going to be there, but as long as I actually get to see him, I'll be grateful." Freya looked up at the two moons. "Why did you come on this mission Zoe?"

 Zoe sighed. "I know I'm not the bravest, but we really needed the money, my dad left a few years back and mom isn't doing good with her new relationship, she wants to dump him, but he wants the baby. It's complicated. They said since I was 'smart' I might be able to help on the mission." 

She sighed and looked over at the Monkin. "But this is different than collage math and science." Freya looked awkwardly into the fire; she never knew what to do when someone shared their stories. Zoe looked over at her.

 "What about your scar, how did you get it?" Freya reached up to her face and ran her fingers along her scar. "The people at the Childrens home said my mother did it do me, but she couldn't have, she died during childbirth, I think the old ladies at the children home were just trying to hurt me." 

Zoe sighed again. "I'm sorry. Hey, I can have first watch, you should sleep, you seem very tired." Freya really did need sleep. "Okay, thanks." Freya crawled to the back of the cave and lay out on the stone floor.