Those Who Remain

By the Skin of Our Teeth

Ander's Point of View

“Ashton?” I mumbled, half awake. I could have sworn I felt him move against me. Although when I rolled over I discovered that, once again, I was alone in the sleeping bag.

Looking out of the entrance of the cave, my eyes met the velvet black sky. Millions of tiny stars winked at me as if they knew something I didn’t. Slipping out of the bag, I sighed relief when my hand found my gun. I pulled my boots on, but left my jacket on the ground. The night air was humid.

Glancing around at the others, I set out to find Ashton. Before I could take a step further, I swore I saw something move at the edge of the forest.

“Ash -” I started, but my breath caught when something rustled in the leaves to my right.

With cautious steps, I moved towards the sound. The thick canopy prevented any moonlight from filtering through to guide my vision. With hesitant hands, I blindly reached through to branches and made my way to where I thought the noise had come from. I whipped around at the sound of a twig snapping behind me. My senses heightened at another swish of leaves coming from a little farther off to my left. I could hear my heartbeat in my ear drums as my eyes searched wildly through the darkness to find the source of sound. And that was when I saw it.

A mountain lion.

It’s yellow eyes made my knees shake. Fear coursed through my veins as I started backing away from the animal. I gasped when my back hit a tree. The cougar turned to stare at me and let out a low growl. Adrenaline took over my body as I started scrambling away frantically. Branches whipped my face as I stumbled through the forest, but the increasing growls told me the mountain lion was approaching closer.

Suddenly something grabbed my waist and yanked me backwards. I tried to scream, but a hand clamped over my mouth and I was thrown back against a tree. With a hand still over my mouth, Ashton’s wide eyes warned me to stay quiet. His stare flicked from me to the mountain lion that was somewhere behind the tree. Slowly, he removed his hand and started to whisper.

Something behind him caught my sight and I moved my hand over his mouth to stop him from talking.

“Behind you,” my voice shook.

“Okay, Ander,” he took both sides of my face in his hands.

With heavy breath, I tried to compose myself despite the fact there were two prowling cougars on either side of us.

“Ander,” his voice was firm, but hushed. “Don’t make eye contact with it. Just look at me, okay? Do not look at its eyes.”

I frantically nodded as I kept my eyes trained on Ashton’s.

“What do we do?” I whispered.

Without breaking eye contact, he reached down and took my gun out of my belt.

“We’re going to run back to the others,” Ashton pressed the gun into my shaking hand. “We need to protect them if there are more mountain lions out there. I’ll lead and you cover my back.”

“Alright,” I lifted my chin.

“Okay,” Ashton glanced behind me. “On the count of three.”

Three seconds wasn’t nearly enough time to prepare myself for what happened next.

The cougars immediately targeted us when we started running, but they stayed out of sight. There was no clear way to tell where they were lurking. Every now and then a pair of eyes would gleam in the darkness, but disappear as quickly as it appeared. It was too hard to focus on the cougars while running backwards and trying not to trip.