After Effects

Chapter 4 • After Effects

Slowly, I crept towards the trees in which the birds were. Definitely not going back to the castle without them, I thought with a shake of my head. My gun was loaded and ready and without hesitation, I lifted the point up towards the trees and narrowed my eyes at each of the birds in turn. There were six of them, and I wasn't leaving any, so with a deep breath I found the trigger.

🔫Boom!Boom!

🔫Boom!Boom!Boom!

🔫Boom!

"Yeah!" I exclaimed before doing my little happy dance which consisted of me shaking my butt awkwardly while moving my hands around in the air, the normal stuff. 

I quickly ran and grabbed the birds with a wide grin. Yas! I couldn't wait to see Jake's face when he saw my bag. Haha....Speaking of Jake... Where was everyone?

I looked around to see no sign of any human life form. My bag fell from my hands as I froze in horror. "Oh no." I groaned as my eyebrows creased with worry. They must all be far away by now. What was I going to do, yell until someone hears me? Ha, no! I wasn't that pathetic.

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10 minutes later
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"Hello!" I yelled as I passed the same spot for the ninth time. "Seriously? Is no one here? And to think I actually thought that people cared about me." I said aloud before continuing my trek. My bag of birds was starting to get heavy on my shoulder and my gun was also gaining a few pounds in my hands. The heat didn't help at all either so now I was wet from my sweat, and tired. Just great!

"Jake!...Dad?...Marlon!...Jeff?!" I bellowed to no avail. "Oh come on, there has got to be someone else in this forest!" I hissed getting irritated. Gosh! "Graham... Hadley?!" I screamed. You could see that I was seriously getting desperate-

Crack!

What was that, I wondered, my head snapping to the left  to some bushes where I could have sworn I'd heard something move causing a twig to snap.

Nothing.

I straightened up and took a deep breath. "Calm down Katy, maybe it was just a cute little bunny and not some man eating beast who is going to deep fry your legs and carve his portrait into your face." I whispered, trying to comfort myself. I guess my words weren't too much of a comfort since I unconsciously gripped my gun tighter.

"Ah?" I gasped as there was that movement near the bush again and it was coming closer. I dropped my birds and held my gun up, there was no way I was dying in that forest. I would make it back to the castle and spend the week there having fun.

Suddenly the movement stopped and the place was eerily quiet apart from the chirping of the birds...but then abruptly, something black shot out of the bushes a few inches off the ground making me scream, and as if on instinct, hold on to the trigger as the loud Boom went off.

"Ahh!" A strangled cry mingled with my scream before whatever was in the bush fell to the ground, clutching where ever I'd shot.

It was a person!

"Grrm!" the man groaned as he held his leg which was now covered in blood. I slowly crept over as the guy shifted while groaning because of his pain.

"Um, are you a serial killer?" I asked suspiciously as I pointed the gun at him even though he was already down. The man looked at me in disbelief.

"You're kidding me right?" he growled out.

"Answer the question," I demanded confidently, I wasn't at the wrong end of the gun after all. The guy suddenly looked at me with a pain contorted face and glared. I shrunk back before adding a weak, "Sir." I might not have been at the wrong end of my gun but I was at the wrong end of his glare, I seriously couldn't tell which one was worse right now.