All Star - Smash Mouth
C H A P T E R 1
WORD COUNT: 2035
"Hasta la vista, baby"
What movie is this from??? The person who guesses right gets a shout out in the next chapter :)
***
TWO days, four hours and fifteen minutes. That's how long its been since I left home. I had expected traveling through the woods easier than this. I had hoped to be a lot further along than I am but seeing as I don't do physical exercise at all, my body isn't accustomed to doing the things I want it to do.
Every hour, I have to stop for a five-minute break so that I can catch my breath.
My new goal is to make it to the other side of this forest in five days. I can just about ration the food for that long.
As I hike through the dark forest, I think about my poor mother. Certainly, by now she is aware of my disappearance. I wonder what she will be doing right now. Will she be conducting a manhunt for me? Or will she be wallowing in sadness?
A loud squawk resounds throughout the silent forest. My body freezes for a second and I pay close attention to my surroundings. When I see a crow flapping its pitch black wings, weaving through the trees, I release an anxious breath and continue on my trek. The canopy of leaves forms a safe passage for me from the harsh rays of the sun.
For the third time today, I lean my body on an enormous tree and catch my breath. A small breeze picks up, causing the leaves to rustle together. I glance upwards at the almost green leaves, noting how they completely shield me from the sky.
Exhaustion over washes me, my legs pleading for me to sit down and give up. But my mind does not agree. I must go on.
When the wind has died down, I observe the woodland. Most of it looks the same - trees, broken branches on the ground and small holes that lead to animal homes. There's something about this forest that is mysterious. It's an odd thing to think but a part of me thinks it holds dozens of secrets that are waiting to be uncovered - by me.
The rational part of me thinks its a silly notion but on the other hand, my superstitious side is fully convinced.
Before I can delve deeper into my thought process, a twig snaps. My head snaps to where I think it was, my eyes scanning the area closely.
At first, I don't notice a thing. As I'm about to brush it off as a rabbit, I see a flash of golden hair zooming past a tree. But just as quickly as I saw it, it evaporates. For a second, I believe my eyes are playing tricks on me.
But then I catch another crunch.
My body stiffens with fear. If someone is there, I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm not fast enough to run and I don't know if I can talk my way out of a bad situation. After all, I have been isolated my whole life. My social skills probably aren't the best.
A tall form sneaks between two trees. My stomach leaps when I hear a giggle. A girl's giggle.
Mustering up some courage, I swallow hard. "W - who's there?"
No reply.
Crunching leaves from the other side of me draws my attention away from the tree where the blonde form was.
Staring in the other direction, I squint my eyes. Nothing. I see nothing.
"Choose." A woman's voice says, right in front of me. Jumping in fright, my heart hammers in my chest.
My grey eyes widen in shock at the sight of her. What captures my attention the most is the color of her eyes. They are the same silver-grey eyes as mine. Except, hers hold secrets, dark secrets that I long to discover.
Next, is how gorgeous she is. With long, wavy white hair and sharp, pale features, she looks like a goddess. Or a queen. Judging by the way she's holding herself and the air of confidence around her, she is a strong character. An intellectual character.
"W - What?" I ask her shakily.
I glance to where I heard leaves crunching, curious as to whether I see another person. When I don't see anybody, I turn back to the women. But she's gone. My head inspects the area, searching for long white hair. When I only see trees and mud, I slump my shoulders in defeat.
What on earth was that? I think, puzzled.
And then I think: how did she just vanish?
Either she's a fast runner, which makes sense since I could barely see her earlier or...
I'm not going to think of the other option.
It takes me a couple of minutes to recover from whatever I had witnessed. When I do, I continue to embark on my mission. Get to the other side of the forest in five days.
By the evening, my feet are screaming in pain, my breaths coming out short. I stop at a small clearing area and search some twigs to make a fire. Once I get the fire started, I relax on a log and get a tin of baked beans out. Normally, I hate cold food like this but since I have no choice but to eat them, I don't mind. It beats starving.
After eating the delicious beans, I stand up, dusting off the mud and unroll my sleeping bag. On my first night here, I was terrified. I could hardly sleep a wink because I was scared either a bug was going to crawl on my face or a big animal would eat me.
But now, I don't care because I know I need sleep.
My tired eyes begin to droop. Happily, I let sleep overcome me.
***
The sound of loud growls wakes me up. In fear, I jump to my feet and scan the forest, in alarm. Unfortunately, since its so dark, I can't see much. The silhouettes of trees are the only things I can properly make out.
Another growl, followed by a whine sends shivers of fear down my spine. I knew wolves live in the woods but I always thought they were more south, that's where all of the sightings of them were...
The ferocious noises begin to get alarmingly louder. This sends me out of my frozen state. Quickly, I snatch my backpack and sleeping bag from the ground and sprint the opposite direction from the growling wolves.
With my fight or flight mode in play, I use the rush of adrenaline to my advantage and the fact that the wolves don't know about my existence yet. The moment my body crashes down to the ground, their growls seize.
Suddenly, I heard loud rumbles getting closer and closer to me. They are running towards me.
With that thought in mind, I pick up my pace.
Shortly after beginning this sprint, I begin to feel tired. My labored breaths are a clear sign that I'm going to start losing momentum.
The sound of paws thudding against the hard floor fills my ears. They are getting closer to me.
My brain demands me to glance behind my shoulder to see how close they are. I don't want to. But its an instinct. To see how close the danger is.
Staring over my shoulder, I yelp in fright at how close their proximity is. They are so close that one snapped it jaws inches away from my feet. Oh my god...
A scream escapes my lips when once again, I trip and fall on the cold, hard ground. My arms scratch against fallen twigs, my face nearly colliding with mud. My body turns around so I'm facing the sky, my elbows lifting me from the ground.
The first thing that I notice is the two gigantic wolves, snarling in front of me. Both of them have long, matted fur with blood stains on them. Both of their red eyes glow with malice and hate. Their canines are on full display, warning me if I move then I will not like the consequences.
The bigger wolf, who has reddish-brown fur, steps forward, an aura of authority around it. My heart thumps in my chest when the wolf takes another step to me, practically hovering over my body.
It lowers its face so that its inches away from me and begins to sniff. My whole body freezes, the only thing moving is my chest as I breathe heavily.
For several seconds, the wolf smells me. I remain as still as I can be like a statue. Eventually - to my absolute relief - it stops and turns stares at me directly in the eye. Its ruby red eyes filled with despise captures my full attention.
The other wolf behind it growls, almost in warning.
To make matters worse, a loud, howl vibrates through the wolves. Something about this gives me a warm feeling. At this point, I think I'm beginning to lose it. How can a noise from a make me feel safe, content?
The other wolf stood, who gave a warning earlier, is quick to sprint away. Leaving me with the wolf above me.
It backs off of me. The wolf gives a long look to the side of the trees where the other wolf ran off to, like its debating whether to venture after it or not. Then the wolf turns back to face me and roars.
I scream in terror and attempt to scramble away. Hot tears roll down my cheeks and my lips tremble with fear. This is it. I'm going to die.
Oh god.
The wolf leaps into the air, landing in front of me and tears its long, elongated teeth into my leg. A cry of pain turns into a scream of agony as it bites me like a chew toy. My other leg kicks uselessly.
The wolf then let's go, catching my eye for a second. I see a glint of satisfaction in its eyes. Is that right? Oh no, I really am losing it.
And finally, to my utmost relief, it rushes off down the same path as the wolf. Whilst I am pleased it didn't mangle me to death, it has ruined my leg. Blood drips down my leg onto the muddy ground. I know I'm losing to much blood, too quickly. If I don't get this sorted soon, I'm going to bleed to death.
I attempt to sit up, wincing at the flush of pain.
And then I begin to feel woozy.
No, no, no!
Before anything else happens to me, I grab the end of my t-shirt and rip off a bit of cloth. Then, I hunch over and wrap the cloth around my leg, biting my tongue at the horrifying burning sensation I feel.
To make my misery continue, a bush close to my rattles. With whatever energy I have remaining, I angle my head to the bush.
Nothing.
A whine from somewhere close to me changes my attention. Another wolf, a different wolf, makes itself known. This wolf is much larger than the other two and has an aura of dominance and great power around it. With ash brown fur and hazel brown eyes, it stares deeply into my eyes.
Electricity crackles around us. The whole ordeal is so bizarre that I think the loss of blood is getting to my head.
The ash blonde wolf whines again, bearing its neck to me. Like its submitting to me.
My eyes widen in shock. What is happening?
My eyes flutter closed. I fight to keep them open but tiredness washes over every bone of my body. The wolf notices my tiredness and panics. It rushes over to me and before I can see what happens next, I black out.
My whole body falls into the abyss.
{A/N: What are your thoughts? I'm sorry that ending was so...cliche. Argh. I'll try and make future endings less cliche.
Bye for now! }