The Scars of Six

19. Training Pt. 2

Listen to The World We Made by Ruelle towards the middle!

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It had been approximately five hours since we began our journey back and I was starting to fall back with exhaustion. My bag felt like I was carrying a bunch of bricks and my eyes would droop ever so often and to add to that I felt weaker —heavier with every step. Santiago offered to take breaks every time he glanced back at me but I refused; the quicker we got back, the better plus I wasn't about to show weakness now, not when Argent could be watching and using it as an excuse to keep us here longer.

"Shhhh, do you hear that?" Stopping me in my tracks, Santiago pulled out his hand and pointed towards the east.

I furrowed my eyebrows at him. "No, what the hell are you talking about?"

"Shhhh."

I arched an eyebrow and crossed my arms against my chest.

"Water, there must be a river nearby. C'mon we need water, we barely have any left" he said as he went towards the sound of the water.

I sighed and huffed my way over; not that I didn't want water, but my mind couldn't focus enough to hear any water.

About thirty minutes later we came to a stop at a small bay of water with a beautiful waterfall to join it. The sound of the water crashing with water was lulling me to sleep as I stood there admiring the element. "Hey!" Santiago yelled snapping his fingers in front of my face.

"What?" I grumbled through narrowed eyes.

"You need to eat or else you won't be able to make it a few more hours." He said as he handed me an MRE, while I grimaced at the disgusting thing.

He nudged it towards me and after a couple of minutes, I took it and ate it as I suppressed the feeling of throwing it back up. I took my canteen and finished the rest of the water in it and began to fill it back up again with water and just as I was about to take a sip Santiago chucked it out of my grip.

"Hey! What the hell!" I yelled.

"You cant just drink this straight from the source. You could get sick and we both don't want that."

"Then how are we supposed to drink water then?" I asked annoyed.

"We use this and this." He said as he held up a translucent bottle and a rag.

I was just about to ask how that would help when he began explaining. "We scoop up the water, put this rag over the clear bottle and pour the water in." He explained as he started to pour in the water. I arched an eyebrow at him, "Why?" I asked him genuinely curious.

"Because of this." He said as he gestured to the small amounts of dirt and tiny rocks that sat on top of the rag. My nose scrunched and I nodded thankful for the fact that I didn't swallow anything. "Then we close it and let it sit out in the sun, so the sun can cleanse it, if that makes sense."

I shook my head, he sighed. "The sun makes the water hot as hell, in a way it's like boiling your water, so you can drink it."

"Got it, why don't we just boil it over a fire?"

"It can draw unnecessary attention, plus the sun is at its highest during these hours. Let the sun do the work for us that way we won't exhaust our resources." He explained as he filled up a couple more clear bottles.

Smart, I would never think twice about any of this. Fortunately enough this is why I was here, this wasn't my forte, but soon enough it would be or at least enough so if I was stranded alone or if one of us wouldn't make it, we'd know what to do.