“Have any more encouraging things to say?” Ryan curtly riposted.
“Better figure the worst. At least things can only get better,” Lee replied dourly.
Fully out of his element, Ryan was lost in a bizarre forest where the first two living creatures that he had set his eyes upon were entirely foreign to him. The specter of danger was palpably tangible to his senses, whether it lurked in the trees, the sky above, or upon the ground.
A freezing anxiety arose to grip him in the wake of his rapidly diminishing hopes. The feeling traveled through Ryan with a mildly paralyzing effect, and he felt as if the world itself was compressing him from all sides.
LEE
Lee saw the glistening forming across Ryan’s eyes, feeling immediate empathy for the deep plight of the man-child. He knew that Ryan’s fierce pride was straining to hold back any visible sign of weakness. Yet Lee also knew that something rigid and inflexible could be shattered in an instant when enough pressure had been applied.
Lee spoke to Ryan in as methodical and reassuring a voice as he could muster.
“We have some things to learn, probably a whole lot of things. We will simply learn whatever we have to know, to make it through all of this. There is no other choice, so let’s set our minds on this one. I have your back covered, Ryan. I’m afraid, and there’s no harm in saying so, but fear can’t stop us from getting through this unless we let it.”
“And these creatures? Do we stand a chance in a world like this, where we don’t know the first thing about what’s around us?” Ryan responded, his voice strained and shaking.
“Stop and think for a moment, Ryan. Remember, even in the world we are familiar with, the animals are stronger and faster,” Lee replied. “Even an insect can carry several times its own bodyweight. But there is one thing that took us humans to the top of the heap, so that we didn’t have to constantly huddle in fear, and hide from predators.”
Purposefully, he slowly brought his right hand up, and tapped the side of his temple firmly to punctuate his words.
“It’s this. Right in here. The mind. And we both still have that with us,” Lee said.
“I don’t see how I do. I can hardly think right now,” Ryan retorted, staring downward.
“Okay, then maybe it is best that we find something that we can put our minds to. We need to know the lay of the land, we will need water eventually, and we’d better make ourselves some kind of weapon,” Lee said, hoping that the simple logic of his words would find root in Ryan’s troubled mind.
Ryan stood in rapt silence. His expression was dour, and Lee knew that Ryan’s mood was vacillating between the opposing forces at work inside of him. Lee waited patiently on the young man. As if dragging a heavy weight, Ryan finally brought his eyes up to meet Lee’s.
“It’s worth a try,” Ryan announced rigidly.
Once the youth had said the words, it was as if one part of him was unlocked and freed. He looked intently at the ground all around them, and without a word, walked over and picked up a fallen branch off of the forest floor. Placing one knee on the branch to pin it to the ground, he began ripping away the smaller offshoots growing out from it.
When he had stripped the branch bare, Ryan rose up and started walking back up towards the summit of the hill, continuing to examine the ground. Lee followed behind him quietly, continuing to watch.
Using the stripped branch, Ryan scraped around, revealing the rough edge of a jutting rock. Utilizing the edge of the rock, he patiently worked at one end of the branch until it was crudely sharpened.
He turned back to Lee, gripping the rough spear about midway down its shaft. Ryan looked into Lee’s eyes, and something a little more firm and resolute was within his gaze now.
“Then we can start with this,” Ryan proclaimed. “Start with the weapons, and then look to the rest.”
Lee stifled a smile, proud. It was one less thing that he had to worry about in the midst of the unbelievable situation.
“Well done, a good job,” Lee commented, with no hint of being patronizing, in sincere appreciation of the young man’s fortitude.
Lee walked by Ryan, pausing momentarily to pat him gently upon the shoulder. Another elongated, stout branch, which probably had been broken off during a powerful storm, lay a few feet beyond them.
Lee picked up the branch and began to strip it.
ERIN
“Okay Lynn, what is this?” Erin asked, irritated and unnerved at the relentless fog swirling all around them.
The fog had encircled them fully, forbidding any forward vision and cooling the very air around them. She could feel the damp, chilly vapors brushing against her arms, face, and lower legs.
“Come on, Erin. It’s time to get back around that fire,” Lynn said resolutely, reaching out and taking her friend’s hand.
“We can hardly see a thing, though,” Erin replied, squeezing Lynn’s hand firmly in her anxiety as they turned to make their way back to the campsite.
“Then we go slow, and we call out for directions. Just follow the voices of Uli and Razor in. We’ll probably walk right into them. It won’t be a problem at all,” Lynn stated. She took a few cautious steps forward, gently tugging Erin into motion behind her. “Come on, let’s start this way. Watch your step. Be careful.”
Progress was painstakingly slow. The encumbering fog prevented Erin from catching even a glimpse of the campfire, though she was certain that it was just a short distance away.
“Hey! Razor! Uli!” Lynn called out loudly. “Where are you guys?” Her voice carried off through the fog, as silence settled back in around them.
They stood still for several moments, waiting for a reply from their friends to help with their bearings. None was forthcoming.
Again, Lynn yelled out to their compatriots, and once again there was no response.
“This is no time for jokes,” murmured Erin in sharp displeasure, delicately stepping over the trunk of a fallen tree that was in their path. She did not recall stepping over a tree trunk when she had gone into the woods, and began to worry that they might have oriented themselves in the wrong direction.
“They had better not play around with us,” Erin remarked acidly, her uneasiness fueling her vexation. “They know I will give them hell. Believe me, I will. Unholy hell.”
“Tell me about it,” Lynn concurred tersely. “But remember, they are just the type of dolts to try and pull something like that, especially if they figure out why we are calling out to them. They couldn’t have packed up the camp and moved it away in a couple of minutes. We’ll stumble into one of them sooner or later, no matter what.”
“Hopefully sooner,” Erin responded, shaken by the utter lack of visibility.
The two picked their way over yet another fallen tree. They continued onward cautiously, methodically making their way over a fairly open clearance of ground judging by the more sporadic contact with the trees looming out of the fog.
The ground seemed to be flatter, certainly more so than the downward sloping angle that the hillside had, but Erin attributed the perception to her momentary disorientation.
Both Lynn and Erin continued shouting out to their friends, repeatedly, with less than satisfactory results.
“This isn’t it. The area where we were had a lot more trees,” Lynn observed, a noticeable tension in her voice.
“Well, then let’s turn back,” Erin replied, matter-of-factly. It mystified her as to how they could possibly have gotten far away from the campsite.
“I wish it were that simple. Don’t forget, there are cliffs not too far off from the camp. If we keep walking, we will have to go really slow. I don’t want to step off the edge of a hundred and fifty foot drop, and I don’t think that you do either.”
Erin certainly had no argument to that.