Chapter 6
After walking for a couple of hours, they arrived at a small lake and made camp there. There were dark clouds coming in and it looked like rain was about to come any minute.
Ruby sat at the shore with her feet dipped in the water to cool them off after walking barefoot all this time, watching, as Annie was cleaning herself up from swamp water she had been covered in.
“I’m just gonna go have a quick look around, okay?” She yelled out to Annie, who just nodded back to her, still busy scrubbing herself clean.
Ruby got up and headed into the trees, towards higher ground, to find a better viewpoint to see what was around them. There wasn’t much to see once she got up to the top however. There were trees as far as her eyes could see and fog had started rolling in aswell. She did however spot what appeared to be some kind of fruit trees at the bottom of the slope, so she started heading towards them, hoping to score a quick meal for the night.
After a couple of minutes of struggling to make her way downhill through the dense forest, it started raining heavily. It was as if the sky suddenly exploded and everything it had built up for days just came pouring down at once. Her t-shirt got soaked and heavy and started clinging itself to her body.
Should’ve brought my bag so i could’ve kept it dry. She thought to herself as she stopped and looked around. The dirt on the ground started getting all muddy and the slope got more slippery. The entire area looked different now that it was raining. All the sounds from the different birds singing had disappeared and was replaced with the heavy sound of rain shooting down around her, hitting the ground and everything around her with an incredible force. Before she even had decided whether to continue on or turn back, a scream shot through the air from the direction of their camp.
Annie!? She froze and listened. Another scream followed soon after. Ruby started climbing back up as fast as she could from the direction she came, slipping and falling on the wet mud as she forced herself upwards, using the roots of different trees and plants for grip.
Out of breath she reached their camp, she crawled up underneath a bush to get a better view. But she could not see or hear anyone anymore.
Annie! She wanted to call out, but what if there was someone here that wanted to hurt them? She looked over to where Annie had been cleaning herself in the lake. Their bags still stood down by the shore, still untouched, but she could not spot Annie anywhere. She stayed hidden and listened... nothing, nothing at all, only the continuous sound of rain hitting the ground.
After a few minutes, all she could hear was her own heart beating as she stayed hidden underneath the bush, waiting for some signs of anything going on around her. But there were no movement from anyone or anything, so she decided to go for it. Whatever had happened to Annie, she couldn't do anything about it right now, but she needed their bags. Standing up, she carefully walked over towards their bags. However, before she even got anywhere close to them, she heard a voice calling out from behind her.
“So there you are!” It was a deep male voice. “We’ve been waiting for you.”
Frozen by fear, she was unable to move. She could hear the footsteps coming closer behind her. Turning around, all she could see was someone with a dark rain coat with a hood covering his face. He stopped right in front of her and raised his head to meet her face to face. She was surprised to see how ordinary his face looked. He looked as if he were around her own age, and he had long dark hair hanging out from the hood on the sides of his face. And to her surprise, he was giving her what looked like a friendly smile.
“Why didn’t you try to run?” He said, turning his smile into a grin.
“I...” Was all she managed to say before she felt something hit the back of her head. She felt her legs give in and she fell down onto her knees. Her mind was spinning, and she started to lose her consciousness.
“Good thing we found them before the rain washed away all their tracks.” Another voice said. There were even more people around aswell at this point, but now her head hurt so much that she didn’t make a word out of what they were saying.
Ruby could feel her body shut down, she fell forward, trying to catch herself with her arms, but they wouldn’t respond and she hit the wet muddy ground face first before she passed out.