Bygones

~{Chapter 1}~

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I jolt awake from my nightmare and sit up to calm myself down. Having nightmares about people with masks cutting off your limbs one by one isn't so pleasing. I wipe away my sweat and lie back down to face her. She's the only face that keeps me calm, after all, she's all I have. She opens her eyes and smiles.
"Hi mommy."
"Hey sweetie, did I wake you?", I say propping myself up on my elbows. She shakes her head and she goes over to the tent opening.
"Mommy, look! There's birdies!"
"Leyla, that's dangerous, please be careful.", I say as i'm arming myself with my knifes and my wooden spear.
"Mommy can we go check the trap? Pretty pleeease?", she batted her eyelashes at me. I thought about it for a few second.
"Okay, fine. But stay close, and no more running off chasing butterflies, promise?"
"Pink-swear", she squealed and held out her pinky to me. I locked onto her pinky with mine and we headed out of the tent.

We were crouched down beneath thick leaves, a couple of feet away from the trap we set up yesterday. I studied the area around the trap to see if They set up any traps of their own. Once the coast was clear I said to Leyla, "You know the drill, stay hidden". She nodded and grip on tightly to her wooden knife. I never imagined giving a nine year old a wooden knife let alone having to protect herself with it. I crawled out of the leaves and quickly ran to the trap. When I reached it, I scoffed in disbelief. Inside the trap was a hog. I wasted no time pulling it off of the spikes and dragged it back to the leaves.
"Come on, it's getting dark. Stay close.", I say to Leyla in a hurry.

We got back to our camp safely and we had a feast. I started to pack some of the meat into our emergency backpack. They can come at any time and ambush us. I then heard Leyla squeal and scream.
"Leyla! Leyla where are you?!", I ran outside with my knife ready in my hand. Leyla was just sitting there with butterflies all around her. I sighed in relief and put my knife away and walked over to her.
"Is that safe? They're not poisonous right?"
"They tickle!", she laughed, "Here hold your hand out".
She took my hand and a few butterflies landed on it. They were this glowing ocean blue color that sent a wave of calmness through me. I could see where Leyla got her serenity from. She gets up and stands in the middle of the butterfly cluster.
"Come on!", she giggled as she twirled around.
I've never seen her this happy before and I wanted it to last. I got up and jogged to her. The butterflies started to surround me and her. It was so magical and dreamy like. I couldn't help but smile and tag along as Leyla started dancing. As soon as I was fully unaware that it was dangerous down here on Earth, a butterfly was shot down by an arrow. Then all of a sudden, the butterflies stopped glowing and quickly flew away. I grabbed Leyla and bolted for the tent. Leyla immediately got the emergency backpack as I collected my other weapons. Another arrow flew through the top of the tent, but this time the arrow was on fire.
"Come on we need to get out of here", I said as I took Leyla's hand and ran out of the tent. We ran into the woods and into the darkness, leaving the bright orange field, leaving all of our happiness. I looked up as I ran and saw a shower of arrows on fire coming down our way. I grabbed Leyla's arm and pulled her behind a large tree trunk and covered her with myself. The shower of arrows burning arrows poured down from the sky, but failed to burn us up because the ground was damp. I get up slowly and look around. I couldn't hear anyone, but I saw light and smoke about a quarter mile away from us.
"You see that over there? We are going to stay there until sunrise. It'll be safer than us being out here", I panted. She took my hand and said, "Are you sure you're okay to run mommy?". I smiled, "Yeah, i'll be fine. Come on, quickly".

As we got closer, I saw a wall that was made out of sticks and scraps of metal. I knew that there were other human beings and no animal could of built that. We might be safe, I thought. Then a sharp pain goes through my right thigh and I trip and fall, taking Leyla with me, down a hill. It seemed like hours until we reached the end of this hill, and waiting down there were three people with guns pointed at us. I struggled to sit up and I grabbed my gun from the back on my pants and tried to hold it up, but my body, once again, gives up on me. I felt the cold, soggy ground on the side of my face and heard a continuous muffled scream of Leyla yelling mom, mom get up. I tried saying it was okay and I'm here, but I couldn't. Darkness was all I saw. It was strange, but familiar feeling.

I no longer felt the ground on my face anymore, I felt something warmer and softer than the ground. There was something gently hugging my body and my leg didn't hurt anymore. I open my eyes and blink to the piercing sunlight. When my vision became clearer, the piercing sunlight was actually a lamp swinging above me. Then, a face blocked out the lamp and looked down at me. It took me a couple of seconds to realize who it was. Someone I didn't think I would see ever again. The familiar face smiled at me and said, "Hey, Sloan."

~{Hey guys! I hoped you liked the story so far and I just wanted to say thank you for reading! This is my first story I've posted on Wattpad, so if you guys have any questions, comments or suggestions then comment in the comment section below. :)}~
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