The Dark Days

The forest was a terrible place for me. All the insects springing back and forth. The normal insects didn't scare me though, every time I saw a wasp or bee I was afraid it was a tracker jacker. Those things aren't even natural. Don't want to get near those.

Tobias had a branch, a rather small one, in his hand, swiping away all the creatures and plants we shouldn't interact with.

"Toby, how can we reach Twelve through here? It's so far away and I'm really tired!" I complained.

I know, I shouldn't, we're in trouble. In danger. We have to run. Soon people will know we escaped and they'll come looking for us. At least the forest was behind our home, some call the smallest shack they've seen.

"Orchid, please don't do this to me. We have to run!" he replied, throwing his stick at a raccoon.

"That was a raccoon! He didn't do anything to you!" I yelled.

Coming to a sudden halt, Toby looked at me with daggers. I should've stayed silent. With a deep breath, he pulled me onto his back.

"I'm heavy, don't carry me," I said once I sat comfortably on his back.

"This is the only way we'll get through this. You're only twelve years old, it's understandable that you can't handle this much running."

"Just because you're fifteen doesn't mean you can either,"

Shaking his head, he started a steady paced walk. I think we're safe now since he takes his time to reach District Twelve.

How will we survive there? The people there will report us or send us back to Thirteen! That's not what I want. Or even worse, we will get killed. President Snow would send us to execution after escaping a district. Even before the war started, a girl from Twelve escaped to Nine and got sentenced to a death penalty. She was eleven.

The sun was fading through the trees after about two hours of travel. It must be about afternoon by now. I was walking right next to Tobias, gripping his hand. Our bag was on his back now, instead of him holding it. A slight cold breeze blew through the forest sending a whirl of chills through me. Toby shook a bit as well.

"Are we getting close? I'm really hungry Toby and sleepy," I said quietly, worried he'd get angry again.

"I'm going to find a place to sleep, a camp." He said, smiling at me.

Even though we do nuclear technology and graphite in Thirteen, Toby knew how to hunt. With his perfect accuracy that he had ever since he was born, he could hit any animal within a fifty feet radius. After my uncle, he's pretty much the only person who owns a bow and arrow in our house. He usually snuck into the woods even under our strict policy in Thirteen. So, he knows how to live here. But he didn't hunt often, only when he wanted to, okay, only when he could.

He wanted to hunt all the time. It gave him this adrenaline rush that he couldn't stand to be without! But every time he hit an animal, he used the whole thing. He wasn't the type to hunt for no beyond reason, just to shoot something for fun and let it die because of just that.

So when he went, we were lucky at home. Fresh wild turkeys or raccoon soup. That was my favorite.

Looking all around us, he searched all the tree tops for a stable home above ground, just in case someone decided to look for us through the woods. They wouldn't see us up there unless they had those hovercrafts.

"Perfect," Tobias said with a smile, looking at the tree above us.

It was a beautiful one with branches as thick as the one that stood in our backyard, the one that had apples springing off it every summer.