A Liberated Decision - COMPLETED!

Chapter 6

"Wake up, Ash. It's game time." Cam gently pushed her shoulders until she woke up. "We need to get to the meet."

Ashley propped herself up. Her arms were pretty near useless, but she'd do what she had to to push herself the lengths that she needed to. "How long did I sleep?"

"Pretty near the whole trip." He smiled at her. "You looked like you needed it."

His answer told her pretty much nothing, but she refused to ask him again. Her arms nearly gave out, but she made it to standing position and leaned against the moving train. "So how do we get off?"

Cam smiled at her and wriggled his eyebrows. "Just follow me, Ash." He took a running start and dove off the train. He tucked his knees and covered his head in time to roll in the soft grass gently, in spite of the speed of the train.

Ashley shook her head. "Sure, now he tells me." She backed up and began to run toward the opening. Before she could make a clean jump, her foot caught on the edge of the train, allowing her whole body to fling out of the open door, but not giving her the ability to get completely off of the train. She was being dragged, but had enough of a catch in the train to keep her from hitting anything severely yet. Her heart caught in her throat and she tried to force herself not to panic. The second she noticed the train wheels directly in front of her face made panicking a lot harder not to do then she would have anticipated. Any second and her foot could slip, sending her into the wheels to be chopped up into little, unrecognizable pieces.

There wasn't much she could do but hold on until the train stopped, or try to pull herself up enough to release her foot and try for a clean jump. Her heart was beating a mile a minute as she made her decision and began to pull herself up. Her arms definitely were not being cooperative. Her fingers felt like they were going to drop her down to her death. "Damn it Trent! You are trying to kill me!" Her words were drowned out by the sound of the train, as she was pulled further away from Cam. She may have just messed up the meet and signed their death warrants – if she survived this.

Ashley had always been stubborn and that wasn't about to change as she forced her fingers to grab onto the train door. Her teeth gritted together hard as she pulled with 10 percent strength and 90 percent stubbornness. "Ugh! Come on!" Her arms were still weak and just as stubborn as she was. "I'm not dying here!" She pulled harder and tugged her body up with as much strength as she could muster. Her determination worked, she was able to pull up most of her body and release her foot. Now she just needed to not drop herself and either be run over and shredded up or being knocked unconscious.

Ashley weighed out her options, but there weren't many to weigh out. She sighed as she propped her feet against the edge of the train and leaned her entire body out of the cart. If she let go at the wrong time, slipped, or simply misjudged her theory, there wouldn't be any need to worry about Trent trying to kill her; she would have done it by herself. She tried to breathe calmly and lean her body out just right, but the suction of the wind against the train made it hard to breathe smoothly and stay steady.

"Here goes nothing." She barely breathed out and flung herself, back first, out of the train. She reached her arms out and around her knees in an attempt to do a tuck-and-roll. Her head wasn't protected, but she tried to keep it tucked into her body enough to keep from hitting it against anything detrimental. The short, few seconds felt like an eternity as she tried to imagine how much it would hurt the second she hit the not so soft grass and gravel underneath her. Her imagination couldn't depict the reality of it all though, as she felt the sharp gravel dig into her back and pushed her into a rolling motion as soon as she landed. Her body rolled fast and was unstoppable as she slid down a hill, while more gravel and sharp objects poked and prodded into her soft body. They inched their way through her clothes as she began to try to slow herself down. She released her knees and tried to dig her feet into whatever earth she could grab at. She straightened her body out, in an attempt to make it harder to roll. The motion slowed her down enough for her to use her hands to put an end to her rolling demise.