The Differents | ✓

T H I R T Y - F I V E

Sometime during the night, we had regained enough strength to stumble far enough into the forest to find something that would suffice for a shelter. It ended up being a few big boulders that we managed to dig a shallow pit beneath and crawl into to sleep. It didn't do much for the rain that came within a few hours, but it was better than nothing. My sleep, if you could call it that, consisted of me dozing off, trying to shield myself from the rain, and waking up again within fifteen minutes from nightmares. Every time I closed my eyes I felt like I was back to running in the forest, or swimming in the river, or even crashing in the plane. I hadn't had the energy to evaluate my wounds or my mental and physical state when the creatures had stopped chasing us, and I was too scared to do it on my own, at night, and in the rain. So I gritted my teeth and tried to sleep.

Sadly I had never experienced sleeping outdoors in the rain, and by the time the sun had started to rise I was anxious to move. After the events of the night I didn't feel safe staying somewhere for too long, and it felt like every single part of my bruised, battered body was competing against the others for attention.

The rain still hadn't stopped, but after waking up from what seemed like the hundredth nightmare in a row, I knew we needed to go. It wasn't hard getting Sniper's attention because he was already awake, looking just as sleepless and battered as I felt. There was barely enough light flitting through the trees to see anything, but it was enough for me to decide to keep moving.

Before we left, we went over our belongings and our physical state. Most of the things in our backpacks were, by some miracle, dry. But it made sense when I remembered the Core and how they seemed to be prepared for everything. Of course they would make their backpacks waterproof, too. We took out a bit of food and shared it between us in silence. My hand stung every time I moved it and I was pretty sure the cut in my shoulder had reopened during the night as well. I didn't want to check over my wounds but the alternative was to let infection set in, and I would much rather if that didn't happen.

I took my time packing my bag up, rearranging everything so that it was well organized. After I had packed everything up, I remembered I needed bandages and took everything back out again to get them. Sniper didn't comment on it, and was curled up where he had been sleeping, watching the rain drip off the rock.

I finished packing the bags and turned to him. "We need to clean our cuts and stuff," I said, showing him the bandages. He made a hmm sound but didn't move. "C'mon. We have to go clean them or they'll get infected." I pushed him lightly, trying to get him to move. He stayed put, still staring at the rocks. "Okay. I'm going to the river to wash my cuts. If you're not coming with me then stay here," I told him.

He said nothing and continued to stare. I sighed, grabbed my bag, and climbed out from under the rock. The rain was cold and it made the air cold, but I hadn't dried off from the river when the rain had started to pour down, so my nightmare-plagued night had the addition of never being dry as well as pain everywhere.

I reached the edge of the forest with caution. Even though I had seen the metal creatures recede into the forest the night before, I was still half expecting them to be back, snarling at me from the other side.

No such thing happened, however, and the churning water bore no trace of metallic beasts on the other side. I slid down the hill leading to the river, the soil now turned to mud in the rain, and landed with my boots in shallow water. I rolled up my sleeves and crouched by the water, examining my hand.

The scratch marks didn't look deep enough to see any bone, but they were very bloody and the blood was getting in the way. The creature had scratched over a few veins and blood was still dripping from the deepest scratch, as well as the ones in my palm. I looked down at my shirt. As expected, blood was smeared over it.