Beauty and the Bird

Chapter 1: "Different Worlds" by Jes Hudak & George Krikes

If you stood at the bottom of the river, you could see the thickness and height of the trees. They're leaves covered the sky and only strips of sunlight came through. At the bottom of the trees were dozens upon dozens of colorful flowers that covered the grass. The air was filled with birds singing in the morning as a perched on leaves to drink the morning dew left by the rain. Small animals would come out of their burrows. The forest prospered and would continue to prosper. But this wasn't true. If you looked under the flowers, you'd see the grass was dying. If you looked up at the sky, less leaves were covering the sky. But the birds continued to sing and the animals continued coming out of their burrows, because they didn't even notice that their forest was dying.

This was Aiden's first time hunting real animals. He'd been practicing how to shoot at targets but never on something living. He kept trying to convince himself that they are just animals, no one will miss them. They mean nothing. Aiden grabbed his gun and walked with his brother, Liam, and a few palace guards toward the forest.

Aiden looked nothing like his older brother. Liam's hair was blonde and shined in the light, while Aiden's hair was brown and dull. The one thing he had that was special that his brother didn't was his eyes. Liam's eyes were brown while Aiden's were green. However, Liam was extremely well built and bulky. Aiden had muscles but was more slender.

Liam patted Aiden on the pack as they were walking and said, "Are you excited brother?" Liam's voice was husky and deep.

Aiden tried to give a convincing, enthusiastic smile and replied, "I am extremely excited. There is no better way to have my first hunting trip then with my brother." Liam laughed and shot a few bullets in the sky as he hollered in excitement. The guards responded with the same excitement.

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Rowen washed her small, feathery body at the edge of the river. One of her scarlet red feathers fell out and she watched it float away with the river. She looked up and heard her best friend call. Luca flew in and landed next to her. He was a brown feathered bird but had more muscle on his wings. As for Rowen, she always had small wings, but that never stopped her from flying faster than the other birds. Even though she couldn't beat Luca, she could keep up.

Luca looked up at the sky which indicated that he was asking if Rowen wanted to come flying with him. She ignored his proposal and started drying her wings. Luca nudged her and pleated with his eyes. Rowen still refused. Dismayed, Luca got ready to leave. Just as he was about to fly away, Rowen chirped a little tune. Luca turned back to her and chirped the same tune back. It was their special tune that Rowen had used to say she'll come later. Luca flew away and Rowen looked around at the trees. For some reason she felt like flying up to one of those tree branches so she could look at the sky.

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When Aiden, Liam, and the guards finally arrived at the forest, Liam immediately started running in. Aiden shouted at him and asked what he was supposed to do and Liam replied to bring something pretty for father. Aiden was nervous. He had never been in this forest before because of one obvious reason: it was cursed. Even though he tried to convince himself that none of it could be true, a small part of him believed that the animals in the forest were cursed to live forever, however if the animals and if were to die, they would turn into humans.

He held his gun firmly in his hands and approached the forest. As he got closer, he could hear the whistling of the birds and the water that was flowing in a river. Aiden found the river and looked up all around him. The sky was oddly beautiful. It was a bright blue but the clouds were scattered perfectly. It looked like a painting. The sun shined perfectly through the branches and leaves of the trees. And the trees, they went up for miles and never stopped. Aiden was astonished by the forest's beauty. He'd had never seen something so serene and peaceful. As he looked around something caught his eye. The beautiful red bird soared through the ocean blue sky and perched on the top tree branch. There it sang the most beautiful tune. As he starred at the bird, he noticed how the feathers shined in the sunlight. The bird had a bright red body but the top of it's head was dark black. As a put his gun down he heard a shot and quickly looked up. The bird fell from the tree. It had been killed.