Paige
This is how my normal life became chaos. Me and my 4 friends( Jessica,chloe, Clarissa and Anna) won 10 days trip to Africa, which is SO lucky for me. Little did I know my whole life was about to change.
Let me introduce my self. I am 28 years old and my name is Paige. I love reading romance novels and if they are fiction even better. I work in shop and it's really boring job. Since I need money to live and until I find something better to do with my life I am stuck with it. I love cooking, specially baking and feeding people. My real passion is to open up my own bakery, where I can sell baked goods. I am saving up all the money so one day I would be able to open it. Now let's get back to my upside down life.
Going to South Africa from UK was fairly normal, it's after we got there that it became crazy. We got to South Africa at 7am and our tour was to start at 8am, so we didn't have much time to rest. Everyone had bit of jet leg but no one complained. I wanted to rest, but no rest for the wicked. First agenda on our list was to go to safari, which include doing some foraging in jungle. Again it was hot and we were going into a jungle where scary animals lives (anyone think it's stupid idea? ME). We were to have a buddy system. All of my friends were really exited, and were behaving like kids. My friends paired up between them and I ended up with one of our guide. We weren't the only group there. There were about 3 more groups of 4.
"Hurry up Paige " shouted Jessica. "we are going to be late, if you don't come soon".
"Coming , coming " I said
We all got there just before 10am and it was getting more and more hotter by the second. Our guide gave us some useful information on what to do when we are in jungle. Since I was to have a guide as my buddy I didn't pay much attention to what was being said. Just after arriving we were given our own gear which thankfully included cold water, couple of cereal bar, a small package that looked like LUNCHBOX!!!!! and weird looking green colour tube. I had no idea what's in it.
"Hey Jess, what is this"? I asked showing her tube.
"You dosed off, didn't you, Paige what am I going to with you?" She accused me
"What? when?" I sputtered
"This green stuff is to apply to your skin, so the wild animal thinks you are one of the praditor , and won't try to eat you. And Paige stay with your guide". I looked at her innocently, saying I don't know what are you talking about. Just as we were finishing our little discussion, our guide announced that everyone needs to be here by 4.45pm sharp as we will be leaving @ 5pm no mater what, for the resort.
We were following our guide and he gave us a book containing pictures of some plants and asked us to find one specific plan. He said it's called BUCHU short name for Betulina Barosma. My friends went one way and I follow my guide. We were going further and further in to the jungle, so I decided to stick close to my guide. I constantly felt like I was being watched, I looked around but saw no one. I found a plant that looked similar to the one we were looking for, so I asked my guide to have a look. He looked bit agitated, more like on guard. I didn't think anything of it, as he should be on guard, because he brought us into the JUNGLE. We silently eat our lunch , which was delicious by the way and started looking for the plant again. I was starting to think how I have wasted 1 day of my trip to sweat in this jungle, but rather than complaining I decided to make most of it. I decided to sit and watch beautiful animals, going about their day to day life and keep an eye on my guide. He was still searching for the plant. I must have dosed off or something because ,One minute my guide was there looking at the plant and next minutes he wasn't there. I shouted and shouted for him, but he was nowhere to be found. I was getting scared and felling of being watch just came back 10 times worse and made me scared more. Rather than panicking I decided to make my way back to the camp. It was 4pm, so I had plenty of time to get back to our camp. It only took us 20 minutes to get here so I should get there in plenty of time.
The only problem is I was following our guide and wasn't paying much attention to where he was taking me. I made a promise to myself, from now on I will pay attention to every single detail if I make it out of this jungle alive. I decided to look around to give me some clue of which way to start walking. I found the tree where I sat and decided to go that way. I walked for about 15 mins and realised I am going in circle, so I stopped. Being watched feeling came back again, so I turned around to look. I wish I hadn't. There was a huge , scary looking dog growling at me. He must be about 5 feet tall must have been high breed. He was beautiful but really scary. I know not to run from predators, so I calmly walked back ward. As I took one step, it started growling louder, and stopped me in my track. I started looking for something to distract it. I bend down and picked up a stick, and threw as hard as I can. He ran after the stick, and why wouldn't he, after all he is a dog. Decided to not waste any more time, I ran the other way. After about 10 minutes I saw a house. I was just about to thank god for saving me, I heard growl behind me and from my side. I wasn't going to turn and make it worse for me, so I ran as fast as I can and just reached the gate. I started screaming as loud as I can to let people on other side of the gate know that I need help. A man came and open the gate for me (I didn't know what took him so long). He looked over my shoulder and growl back at the dogs, yes!!!! Dogs!!! 3 dogs were chasing me. As I was on the other side of the gate my bravery came back in full force and I growl at the dogs too.
Guy took me through the huge house in to the back garden. Few people were sitting there. It looked like some kind of meeting was taking place. Everyone turned to me as I enter or exit the house in this case. The guy who lead me here introduced every one. Man in the centre was called Anthony , he looked around 60, but still in pretty good shape. Come to think of it everyone here looked pretty amazingly fit. Second guy looked around same age and his name was Dominic. Third guy looked around 40 and his name was Malcolm. The guy brought me here didn't introduced himself, so I guess he isn't important enough, I called him Micky . I explain to them what happen and if they could help me get back to my resort. Everyone looked at me as if I grew fur. even I had to look down at my self to see if I have got something on me, ok I was bleeding from few scratches and my clothes were dirty, my face had some smudges . I wouldn't win any beauty contesting this attire , but I was being chased by 3 scary looking dogs, so I held my self higher by looking straight at them, saying what are you looking at? They were pretty scary looking bunch, Anthony started laughing as if I mad a joke, Which just pissed me off, and his next words just left my mouth wide open.
"You are trespassing" he indulged "you are our prisoner and you are not going anywhere".
"What the hell are you taking about"? I shouted "your guy just let me in, I am not trespassing".
"He let you into the house, but you were already on our property when you came here. See dear this property runs for 100miles and half of that jungle you were in belongs to us". My mind just went blank, I didn't know what to do, I just stood there like a statue. It can't be real, real people don't keep trespasser in prison, they call police. I kept telling my brain to think, think, think of something to get us out of this situation.
"If I an trespassing, shouldn't you call local police?" One point for me
"We are the law here, and our words are the law here".
"Everyone's words are law in there own house, but on outside world normal people have to follow government law." I explain as he was a child.
"No I am the law!!!!! This whole city follows my order, even your little government" well until tonight he mumble. I didn't quite catch the last bit, but that's what it sounded like. It didn't look like I was getting anywhere with them, I decided to look around to see if I could spot any female, who can help me with this situation. But no such luck and my brain decided to shut down on me as well. Anthony looked at Micky and asked him to take me inside.
"How long am I to stay here?"
"Until, I decide what to do with you."
"Can I at least ring my friends to let them know, that I am ok?"
"No"
"What......."
"I said NO"
I decided to bid my time until everyone's gone to sleep, then I will slip out of here. As Micky was leading me inside the houses I could still hear them taking. One of them asked Anthony "when are you going to tell him?" Anthony replied "he just came today, I will tell him ....... and now she came here early as well, my plan for does not start until tomorrow". Micky led me to a room and asked if I need anything to eat before he goes. And informed me that I am to stay in this room until tomorrow , If I seen outside this room I will be put in the real jail in basement. I just shook my head for food as if I would eat anything that they give me, it could be poison. At least my brain decided to wake up. I tried opening the door but Micky had locked it from outside. I started looking around the room, to see if I can find something to use for my advantage. I found few useful things such as torch for one, and that green weird looking tube, it looked the same as what I have. Hey where is my bag? I didn't even realised that I was missing my bag until now. Guess I didn't pick it up from the jungle, because I was too busy looking for my guide. I hope he is ok and didn't get in much trouble by loosing me.
I can still see everyone sitting in the garden including Micky. On my search I also found out that this room's balcony is adjoining with the room next door, but I can't go out and see. My brain is loading all the ideas in one go, wow it's fully awake now.
> If I go out everyone would see me, so I would have to wait until dark or when everyone's gone inside.
> If I wait till everyone's gone inside than it will be bit tricky to get past them.
> My only chance is to either go now or wait till everyone is asleep.
> I could slide vertically in balcony and see if I reach room next door.
> I could try to pick lock
I decided to keep searching , just in case I find something useful. I found some keys, which I have every intension of trying on the lock. Some books on supernatural characters, medicine book for wear wolf (Weird), magic book with spells. Oh my god they are in cult, but they look so normal, then again they imprison me, so I am SO going now before they decided to eat me. I tried all the keys and lucky for me one of them worked. I guess Micky didn't think of that or it was just luck. I can still see them outside, so it's now or never. I slipped out of the room, trying to listen if anyone is in the house. I tiptoe all the way to down stair and went for the front door. Door was open (weird), I guess when you are the law you don't have to worry about breaking and entering. I ran out as fast as my legs would take me. I sprinted past the gate and didn't even look back. I remember running straight from forest , so any way was good way. I went left and stayed near dirt road. I didn't stay on the road just in case I was being followed, and I would be easy found for them. I walked what felt liked hours, but it probably was only an hour. I could hear some cars coming, but couldn't make my mind up on what to do. Go out on the road and ask for help? What if they are Anthony's men? All this would be for nothing. Think, think, ok I need to go bit further in to the jungle but, stay align with road, so not to loose it. As soon as the cars are gone I will go back to my original plan of walking to civilisation. There were about 6 cars and they were coming from opposite side, they must be going to Anthony's house as I didn't see any other houses around here. One of the car decided to stop but didn't stay for long, My heart nearly popped out of chest thinking they must have seen me. Lucky I didn't ask for help, as soon as I couldn't hear the cars I started walking back towards the road.
I must have walked for about 15 mins and heard another car coming . I had just about enough time to hide my self. Must have walked another 5 mins and heard another car, so this time I decided to stay in jungle and walked along side the road. 2 more car passed by, so my decision to stay in jungle was good decision. I was getting tired by the minute and was praying to see civilisation soon. I was dreading having this new feeling of being watched. I turned around and see 2 of those same dogs and 3 males. I thought because the dogs are with their owners I was safe. I started asking for direction to go the nearest phone or if they have a phone that I can use to ring my friends. They started laughing as if I made a joke. ( what is it with the people here, are they all crazy?). Dog started coming towards me and I asked their owner to stop them but they just kept laughing at me. I was walking backward the entire time and realised that dogs were trying to drive away from the road. I had no other choice but to continue and was just thinking if the same trick would work twice.
I turned around and ran as fast as my leg would take me, which is not much faster compare to dogs, they were catching up really fast. It felt like I was being chased for hours, silly thing is that it felt like the dogs and their owners were playing with me. I ran as fast as I could. I am SO going to gym when or if I get back home. As I kept looking back to see how much distance I have made between me and the dogs and I bang in to the tree and lost my balance.