Children of the Ark ✔️

Chapter Sixteen

"Then this counts as the same thing! You are leading us into battle, so if we die, then it's your fault!" At this point everyone joined in the arguement. Everyone was yelling at each other. None of us caring if anyone else could hear us. We were still a days trek away from the Lion Clan, so nobody was worried about them finding us out here. Bickering like children.

"STOP!" Tyler and Jackson yelled at the same time. Jackson gave a look at Tyler that said "You can tell them off."

I heard him sigh before he started what was probably going to be another lecture. He probably saw us all as children. "You need to stop arguing. Who know who or what heard all that. We have a mission. To try to find more people to help us attack the Snakes. Not to stand here and argue. I trust that Jackson knows what he is going to say to convince the leaders to let us take some of their people. Bastien, you don't need to argue with them every chance you get. Everyone is tired I get it, but when we get to the Lion Clan, we can rest. Now. Can we get to the Lion Clan without breaking out into another argument?"

There were a lot of mumbles of agreement and we set off walking again. It wasn't long until we heard something that we were dreading. Everyone stopped walking and tried to listen harder to figure out what the sound was.

It was clicking.

Everyone whipped out their weapons and formed a circle with everyone facing outwards. Pointing out weapons out into the forest surrounding us. Eyes scanning everywhere. Trying to figure out where the clicking noise came from. 

The clicking started again, but this time it was in two places. Then it was in four. Eight. Suddenly it was everywhere and getting louder by the second. I squeezed my hands to my ears, the side of the gun pressed against my head. Everyone following suit, also squeezing their eyes shut.

I was suddenly pushed to the ground and I felt something squirming on top of me. I felt the gun slip from my grasp as I try to push whatever is on me without taking my hands off my ears. I squint my eyes open and see a massive brown thing on my chest. 

It looked like it was covered in brown plates. It had two sets of antenna that were twitching. It's legs ended in sharp points and they were sticking to my clothing. It was a massive cockroach. About the size of two loaves of bread. And it was on top of me.

I freaked out and took my hands off my ears to push it off. The clicking noise intensified, but I managed to quickly push it off me. I felt three more swarm onto my back just as I turned around to crawl and find my gun. 

I forced myself to not push my hands to my ears and crawl into a ball. I forced myself to crawl forward while feeling more and more of these mutant cockroaches crawl all over me. I was too focused on trying to find my gun that I had forgotten about my knives.

I was just about to reach to grab one of my knives when I felt something bite down on my leg. It wasn't a big bite, but it sure was painful. I let out a yell and kicked my other leg at whatever just bit me. I started to feel more small bites all over my body. I heard someone else scream. I wasn't able to do anything to help them. I had to get these off me first.

I was writhing on the ground trying to get the cockroaches off me. Kicking, punching and pushing them off me. I managed to get one of my knives out and started stabbing at them, but the knife just bounced off their armoured backs. More and more were swarming over us. More and more bites all over our bodies. 

No one cared if someone heard us anymore. We just wanted to be saved from these things. I pushed another one off me and realised that their undersides were soft, not hard like it's shell. I grabbed the closest cockroach and stabbed the soft part. The knife sunk through. It was still squriming, but I was sure it wouldn't survive now.