Winter Wasteland (The Pack)

Chapter 11

Warnings: Little bit of blood in the beginning.

     ~Rob's P.O.V.~

"Ugh this fudging hurts." I state quietly to myself, glancing at my bandaged ankle.

Now with dull grey morning light illuminating the area I can clearly see the blood soaked fabric tied around my ankle. Although the harshly ripped strip of fabric did succeed in stopping most of the blood, much of it seeped into the dark strip, bleeding right onto the snow. My stomach churns at the image of a giant gash dug into my flesh, angry red skin surrounding its edges. I shudder and turn my attention to something other than the pain of my ankle... My hunger. My stomach is begging for food as I sit there miserably beside the lightly snoring Preston. Hang in there mr. Stomach, we'll get something soon. I soothe, bluntly realizing I'm having a conversation with my stomach.

"The sun isn't too high yet... A few minutes more of sleep won't hurt..." I mumble, scooting back into my little snow burrow.

The pain numbs away with the help of the cold snow and before I know it I'm back asleep, wishing that this whole thing is just a bad dream and next time I wake I'll be back in my cabin at the village.

~~~

"Rob... Rob...? Rob get up. ... This is why you can't get a job Rob." A familiar voice calls impatiently. "Cmon get up you lazy cactus."

I groan, rubbing my bleary eyes. For a peaceful moment I imagine I'm back in my own bed, nestled under my covers. That is until the searing pain returns to my ankle, brining me back to reality. With heavy eyes I look up at Preston's slightly blurry figure, hovering beside me.

"Five more minutes..." I groan, pulling my hoodie over my eyes.
"Alright then. Good luck surviving on your own..." Preston teases, audibly walking away.

I glare at him through a half lidded eye, examining the victorious smirk on his face. You haven't won yet.

"Ohmygosh Preston look! It's Jerome!" I exclaim, shooting up regardless of the burning in my ankle.
"What? Where?!" He shouts, turning in a full circle.

I break out in laughter, earning a pleasing frown from Preston. He rolls his eyes, kicking up a puff of snow into my face.

"Hey! That wasn't very nice." I pout, sticking out my bottom lip.
"Whatever. Come on we need to go."
"Aren't you forgetting something?" I point out, motioning to myself.

Preston turns to me, face palming.

"Right."

Stooping down he waits as I hook my arm over his neck, relying on his strength to keep myself up. Then we ascend slowly, myself having to hop on one foot until I'm standing at full length. Awkwardly hopping/liming I struggle along beside him, my ankle not doing much to help our situation. Every time my foot hits the ground a new wave of shocking pain vibrates up through my leg and into my head, resulting in a massive headache. At least it's not broken.

After an hour of aimlessly wandering through the brush and still no clue on our whereabouts we decide to stop and start considering a better plan.

"Okay this is never going to work. We don't know where anyone is, in fact, we don't even know where we are. Let's brainstorm here." Preston states, letting me slip off his shoulders and lean against a nearby tree.
"Any ideas?"

Preston shakes his head and I frown, my own mind drawing a blank. I turn my head to look at our surroundings but all I see is trees and snow. Well that's just a great landmark. Wait... Landmark. A lightbulb clicks in my head and I shoot up straight causing Preston to jump and look at me.

"What is it?! Are the wolves back?!" He exclaims pulling out his bow.
"Nonono that's not it. I have an idea. You can climb trees right?"
"Yeah... Why?" He questions, lowering his bow.
"Well let's find a tree with low branches and you can climb it to the top and see where we are! Who knows, you might even see someone else or better, a village!" I exclaim, waving my arms to show the abundance of trees around us.
"Might as well give it a shot. I mean we don't really have another option here." Preston agrees, stepping up to the nearest tree.

The tree is free of any leaves and a few branches hang low allowing Preston to get some good foot and hand holds. Grunting Preston grips onto a low branch and using his core strength the swings himself up until here hanging upside down like a sloth. Then he kinda shimmies up so he's sitting on the lowest branch. I watch silently as he begins to skillfully scale the tree, stepping on sturdy branches and using his arms to hoist himself up. Within a couple minutes he's already at the top, many feet of the ground. He takes a minute to survey the area, stepping around the top branches. In confusion I watch as he leans towards two branches that are close together and then pull out an arrow with... A paper attached? From what I can see he scans the paper before glancing back up, seemingly in a specific direction.

"Hey Rob! Take a look at this!" Preston calls as he starts to descend from the tree, shoving the paper into his pocket.

With a thump he lands on the ground, bounding over to see me and pulling out the crumpled paper. In rough writing, seemingly of dirt, the punctured paper reads 'go to mountain peak V and L'.

"Go to mountain peak? What's that mean?" I question, although the 'V and L' implies who it's from.
"I don't know how they did it but Vikk and Lachlan must have written this. When I was up in the tree I saw a mountain in the distance, and it's the only one for a while. They must want to meet us there." Preston explains, nodding his head towards the direction he was previously looking. "Pretty sure that's West."
"Well it's the closest thing we have to finding everyone else so I guess we should go." I comment, hopping over to Preston and leaning against his side.
"Yeah, let's get going while we can."

Preston starts forward and I limp along side him. It's only a couple minutes later when I catch a glimpse of a small piece of paper shaking in the wind. It's caught in the leaves of a bush.

"Preston wait up, I think I see something."

Preston stops and I hop away from him, leaning into the bush and dislodging the paper, one again attached to an arrow. At this point Preston has come up beside me, reading the dirt written words over my shoulder. 'Go to mountain peak M and J'

"Yeah this was totally meant for us. M and J must stand for Mitch and Jerome." I confirm, handing Preston the arrow and tossing the paper away.
"Then away we go."

     After a while of agonizingly slow walking we finally stop in a clearing to take a break. Preston goes off to use the bathroom leaving me standing on one foot in the middle of the field. The sky is grey and clouded, snow steadily falling from the sky. I look off to the West discovering that Preston's claims are true. A fair bit away is the huge outline of a mountain, silhouetted against the otherwise flat landscape. Soon enough I find myself slipping into a daze, the flurry of snowflakes lulling me form reality. That is until a pair of fingers are snapping in front of my nose.

"Earth to Rob, are you there?"
"Oh wha- yeah yeah I'm here." I blabber, shaking the snow off my head.
"You spaced out there dude, something on your mind?"
"What isn't on my mind right now honestly." I joke.

Preston chuckles and nods, casually strolling over to me. Once again I throw my arm over his shoulder and we set off through the deep snow. But this time we have somewhere to aim for.

~~~