Chapter 12
Another streak of lightning lit up the sky, and the clap of thunder followed almost immediately after.
The storm was getting close.
Fast.
“Guys, get up!” I found myself shouting once more to wake the others. “We need to get moving!”
My teammates began to stir, and I leaped to my feet to start gathering what I could. The quick motion made the cut on my stomach burn, but I ignored it and forced myself to move through the pain.
The rain began to come down hard and fast, and everyone was awake by that point. Sadie rushed over to help me pull down the food backpack, while Parker, Tyler, and Claire gathered whatever supplies they could manage, along with the remaining spears and a small pile of our dry wood.
Rain pelted down from the sky as another arc of lighting streaked across, and this time the thunder was almost instantaneous.
We shoved the firewood into the spare backpack and the medkits into the food one, and then we rushed to help Martin up. It took four of us to get Martin into a fully upright and standing position, and it certainly didn’t help that he needed to keep his broken leg straightened out.
I knew our help caused him a lot of pain, but we had very few options for where we could touch him.
Tyler and I each grabbed a hand and then supported his upper back, while Parker and Kyle helped push him up by bracing against his lower back. Once Martin was fully upright, I gave him one of our long, sturdy, uncarved branches to use as a walking stick.
He limped heavily, and he couldn’t move very fast, but at least he could move, and I’d help support him so he could go a bit faster.
The rain was pouring down now, and we’d all become soaked, which didn’t help with the cold much.
“Alright, guys!” Kyle yelled over the sound of the heavy rain as he tried to take charge. “We need to leave this area and find shelter, so follow me!”
Funny how Kyle was willing to have the title of leader, and he was certainly more than willing to boss everyone around. But when it came to actually doing work? Suddenly, being the leader wasn’t important.
However, Kyle’s laziness and lack of basic human decency weren’t my biggest concerns at the moment.
My biggest concern was the direction Kyle was attempting to lead the group in, and I quickly stopped in my tracks, which caused the others to do the same.
“We can’t go that way!” I had to shout because at that moment, there was another loud clap of thunder.
“And why the hell not?” Kyle asked as he whirled around to face me.
“That cuts too close to the river,” I pointed out.
“So?” he sneered.
We didn’t have a lot of time to just stand around and argue, and I was beginning to feel frustrated.
“So, the water level in that river was already steadily rising during the day,” I explained in a tight voice.
“What do you think all this extra rain is going to do to it? If we go that way, then we’ll be at risk of getting caught in a flash flood.
I think we need to move further away from the river and seek higher ground. ”
“Well,” Kyle scoffed as he took a step closer to get in my face. “Maybe I don’t give a shit about what you think.”
“You stupid, selfish, stubborn asshole!” I have no idea where the string of names had come from, but I was sick of Kyle’s shit, and once I got started, it was really hard to stop.
“For once in your life, could you not do something simply just to be contrary? We wouldn’t even be in this situation in the first place if you hadn’t been so adamant about ‘sleeping under the stars.’ Look up! Where the fuck are your stars now?”
Kyle opened his mouth to argue, but to my surprise, Clarisse was the one who cut him off.
“You should listen to him, Kyle,” she insisted. “He’s right, we don’t have time to argue.”
Kyle looked thoroughly betrayed, but at least he’d finally shut up.
It was a good thing, too, because I was about to abandon my ‘always stick together’ rule, take who would willingly follow, and abandon his ass.
I helped support Martin as he limped alongside me, and our group moved deeper into the forest, away from the river. Traversing the woods was already difficult enough with all the brush, fallen branches, and gnarled roots that jutted out of the ground.
But the rain made everything infinitely worse.
The water drops pelted into our eyes, and the ground around us became slick and muddy. As we moved through the trees, the ground also steadily became steeper, and our climb grew much more difficult.
Parker had to help me brace Martin as we moved, otherwise we’d both slip and fall, and Martin’s injured leg slowed our progress down significantly.
Still, we’d made it out in time, and it turned out I was right to fear the river. As we moved higher up the mountain, I could hear a loud rush of water from somewhere below us, as if the river had finally released itself into the forest.
We’d narrowly escaped that flash flood.
But we weren’t out of the woods yet, so to speak, because I wasn’t sure how high the water level would continue to climb. Not to mention, if any of us slipped and fell, we could easily slide back down into danger.
Then there was the other issue…
We were still out in the open, and thanks to our status of ‘sopping wet,’ the temperature was steadily dropping for us. If we didn’t find shelter soon, we’d be at risk of becoming hypothermic.
I wasn’t familiar with this forest at all, so I wasn’t even entirely sure if we were headed in the correct direction. What if we never found shelter? How much more time did we have until our twenty-four hours were up? What condition would we be in when we returned to the ship?
The mud got bad enough that Tyler had to join Parker and I in our effort to keep Martin steady, and even then, if it weren’t for his walking stick, he still probably would’ve been swept away.
Martin, Tyler, Parker, and I all trailed behind everyone else, so I could ensure that nobody accidentally got lost or left behind. Every time I saw Sadie or Claire lose their balance or slip, I’d tense to catch them, but they were always able to steady themselves before I needed to.
My legs burned with the exertion, the rest of the muscles in my body also seemed to scream in protest, and I was exhausted both physically and mentally.
I still hadn’t gotten much sleep, and between the firewood collecting, spearfishing, fighting the bear, and now this unplanned hike, I’d put my body through hell without much of a reprieve.
After a ridiculously long and torturous amount of time, we finally got to a spot where the ground leveled out, and I practically cried with joy. Hopefully, the ground would stay level, and the rest of the walk wouldn’t be quite so arduous.
A few minutes later, the massive stone wall of the mountain came into view, and as we moved closer to its base, I could see a section of wall that appeared more shadowy than the others.
When I moved even closer, I realized the shadowy space was some sort of alcove set into the side of the mountain.
Thank God.
“Wait here,” I instructed the others.
Sadie came to take my place propping Martin up, and I grabbed one of the spears before I moved to the small cave to investigate.
I approached the cave slowly, and I paused outside the entrance to listen for any potential threats. But it was impossible to hear anything over the thunder and pounding rain.
I pulled my flashlight out and shone it into the cave, but I didn’t see anything inside. So, I risked venturing further in.
From what I could see by the dim light, the cave was much larger inside than I’d originally thought, and it appeared perfectly dry. There was a small tunnel that led further into the mountain, but I couldn’t see very far inside.
I tried again to listen for any sounds of life, but once again, it was impossible to hear over the storm.
It seemed safe enough, though, and at least in here we wouldn’t be out in the elements.
I quickly moved back to the mouth of the cave and waved the others over, and they all hurried to take refuge from the rain. Once we were all inside, we got Martin settled, and then we focused on getting a fire going.
Thank God our backpacks were waterproof, so even though we weren’t able to save all of the firewood, the wood we did save was still dry and burnable.
We got the fire set up and burning at the center of the cave, and it wasn’t the most impressive one I’d seen, but it was enough to get us dry and warm. I just hoped we had enough fuel to make it last.
I would’ve loved nothing more than to hang my wet clothes beside it to help them dry and to help me warm up faster. But since the aliens didn’t seem to believe in underwear, that wasn’t really an option for any of us.
The best we could do was huddle as close to the open flame as we could, and even though it wasn’t ideal, it still helped a lot.
The next thing we needed to worry about was Martin. His bandages had gotten soaked in the rain, which wasn’t good for his wounds, so I helped Sadie and Parker replace them with fresh, dry ones.
Then I simply sat next to the fire and tried to get warm.
I felt like our twenty-four hours should’ve been over by now. Why were we still here? Time definitely had to move differently while we were in these games, but there didn’t seem to be an actual pattern to it at all.
Sometimes the time moved really fast, and other times it passed so slowly. But if time really could be manipulated by the aliens to feel slower, how much longer would these twenty-four hours last?
I wasn’t sure how much more we’d be able to handle.
Once we were all mostly dry, we dug through the other backpack and passed out the emergency blankets. We gave one to Martin, and then Kyle and Clarisse shared one again. Claire and Tyler claimed the third, and Parker and Sadie took the last one.
“Liam, would you like to share with us?” Parker offered as she and Sadie huddled close together.
“I’ll be alright,” I replied as I moved closer to the fire.
“Come on,” Sadie insisted as she held open her end of the blanket. “It’s freezing.”