The Disbanders

Chapter 8: The Waterfall

"How-how did you do that?", I ask, amazed. "You didn't even look!" He smiles, pleased with himself.

"Practice," he replies. Alexa hits his arm.

"Don't be smug," she says. "He's a born natural," she tells me.

"No seriously, he's the best at it. I don't say that lightly either," mentions Hayden. Chuck crosses his arms proudly.

"I really don't know where it comes from," states Chuck.

    "Well, now I have a high standard to live up to," I say nervously. "I need some strategy. What do the rest of you do, who aren't natural archery prodigies?", I ask smugly, staring down Chuck.

    "If you really can't get it from simply aiming, I know a different approach that you can take," says Hayden.

    "What's that?", I ask.

    "Anger."
    "Anger? How's that going to help me?"

    "You need to imagine your target as something you hate," he says. "You ran away just like the rest of us. There's got to be something—or someone—that you'd like to pass an arrow through," he smirks. "Think about it for a minute."

    I lower my bow and begin to ponder. It certainly wouldn't hurt to try. What could possibly anger me the most? Almost immediately after asking myself that question, Jessica comes to mind. I reflect on the tears I shed when she abandoned me, with the broken promise of a better future weighing me down and disappointing me. The anger for her starts small inside me, but quickly begins to build once again. I purse my lips, slightly biting them from the inside.

    "Give me an arrow," I say, immediately noticing a change in my tone of voice. It stuns even myself. Chuck hands me an arrow and everyone steps away. Hayden plucks away the arrow from the target.

    I begin to picture Jessica's face on that target. I see her blonde hair, with her cheery eyes and her smile, that you could swear was stitched on her. I scowl at the target as I draw back an arrow. The tension in the bow is a good resistance against my building rage. I quickly release the arrow.

    Sure enough, it hits dead centre this time.

I gasp quietly at myself, stunned at what I just did. I feel a smile form on my face uncontrollably.

"I did it!", I exclaim. "I did it! It worked!"

"What did I tell you? I knew it would!", grins Hayden. I walk over to the target to collect my arrow, feeling happy that this time, I have somewhere to take it out of.

I try it several more times, hitting the target each time, while hitting the centre most of the time. I can't help but smile each time.

"Keep practicing, and pretty soon you'll be hunting for us all the time," says Alexa, walking away with the others.

My smile fades as I remember why I'm even doing this. I let my anger be the reason for my success. Surprisingly, it doesn't feel good. I look around for a moment, to see Will looking my way. Our eyes meet for a brief moment, before I move them away. I notice in the corner of my eye that he does the same. Sighing, I take another shot, trying not to imagine Jessica as my target. I need to do this with a clear mind.

Taking a deep breath, I fire one last shot towards the target. It still hits. I sigh with relief. Maybe I don't need to rely on that after all.

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Despite having hit the target using Hayden's strategy, I can't help but dwell on its effectiveness. However, a thought keeps nagging at me. I wonder how effective the anger strategy will help me with actually hunting something. If so, is this how everyone lives out here? Does their rage of the past fuel them?