Young Writers Society

Jerica sat in silence for a long while, listening to the snarling of the wolves down below. She was too weary to have the energy to think any more about their hopeless situation. So, instead, she stared at the bark just past the tip of her toes and zoned out.

She zoned back in when she heard a slight tinkling sound that sounded like wind chimes. There was another box floating towards her. Well, kind of. She darted forward and grabbed it before it could fall. Now she was sitting in the center of the branch, a bit closer to the one where Eve was above her.

She caught the box.

It was small, and when she opened it, she realized that it was entirely useless. Just a small bit of metal that had little holes in it. How was that supposed to help her?

She huffed a sigh and considered just chucking it.

Evaline didn't know how much time had passed. She drifted in and out of sleep, afraid that she may fall again. It was a restless night, but she could afford not being well-rested for at least a few days. Hopefully by then they'd be out of this nightmare world, but... she didn't know. And she hated not knowing what the future will hold.

She woke up when there was a rustling in the branches above her, and she slowly sat up straight in a contained panic. It was now the beginnings of dawn, but the sun hadn't crept up yet.

Evaline quickly glanced around with panic coursing through her, but was relieved to find out that they weren't in danger. When she looked up, she saw another balloon present tangled in the branches above. It was a big one, too.

"Hey," she croaked, throat dry and parched.

She cleared her throat and tried again.

"Jerica," she said. "There's a..."

When she glanced down at her, she saw that she was holding a box and a small item, too. She was looking at it like she had never seen it before. It looked like some kind of whistle, but it was hard to tell from the short distance.

"What is that?" she asked quickly.

Jerica looked up at a rustling in the branches overhead, and at Eve's voice. The package seemed more interesting than the dinky little trinket in her own hands. "Useless... what's that?"

"Don't do anything rash," Evaline said as she slowly and carefully started to move so she could go up another branch and then grab the present above. "I don't know what it is. I'm going to see what's in this."

'Don't do anything rash' Jerica mouthed, mockingly. "Yes, Mother."

She twisted so she could see what Eve was going to pull out of the package overhead.

Evaline rolled her eyes and ignored Jerica, carefully climbing up to the next branch. Without any food and water, she already felt weak, not to mention fatigued from yesterday's activities. Still, she pushed forward, balancing and standing on her feet as she stretched to grab the edge of the present.

Finally she had a grip on it, and she pulled it down. Before she could open it, Evaline made sure she was able to firmly sit back down so nothing could surprise her. She could feel Jerica's impatient prying eyes on her below.

She tore open the box, revealing...

"A bow and arrow?" she said in disbelief, pulling it up to inspect.

Well, this was archaic.

Jerica sprang to her feet in an instant, balancing on the narrow branch recklessly. She leapt forward and grabbed the branch Eve was on -- with barely enough height to do so, then hauled herself onto it. "THAT ONE'S FOR ME!"

Evaline nearly lost her balance from Jerica's childish impulse. Her action only made her even more irritated and annoyed.

Jerica had leapt up to hang on the branch she was on, but before she could pull herself up, Evaline started to pry her grubby little fingers off the branch.

"Stay on the branch below me," she barked. "Whatever. I'll give it to you. But these top branches can't support both our weights."

Rage flooded through Jerica. One, at the audacity of this bitch to try to push her off the branch. And two, at the realization that she was fucked if Eve succeeded. She could pull herself up to the branch, but didn't have a plan in place for Eve to be a bitch about things. Clearly, she'd need to start taking that into account.

Jerica let go with her right hand as Eve clawed at it, hanging freely from her left hand alone, and angrily took a swing at Eve's wrist.

"What is wrong with you!" Evaline angrily shouted as Jerica jabbed her wrist away.

Her wrist stung from the swing, and she wanted to retaliate some more, but two things crossed her mind: a physical fight on a tree was the last thing they needed right now, and she knew there was no chance of her winning against someone with her insane strength.

"Fine," she said in annoyance as she started to head for another branch, but not before safely propping up and securing the the bow and arrow in the box so that Jerica could get to it.

"Keep it. I'll go to the next branch," she grumbled as she did exactly that.

Might have considered going back down if you'd asked me to. Jerica didn't bother answering. Instead, she swung the rest of the way onto the branch. She still had the little trinket clenched between two of her fingers.

She looked at it, half-contemplating just throwing it away now that they actually had something useful. But, she didn't want Eve getting petty over Jerica getting two presents and her getting none. So she reached it up to offer it to Eve. "This is useless, but do you want it?"

Evaline was at the next top branch, annoyed that she had to move to a flimsier location, but whatever. She was just sitting on it, and she wanted to get away from Jerica.

As she got comfortable, Jerica extended up the item, and Evaline stared at it.

"...Sure," she said as she took it off her hands, inspecting it. "It looks like a whistle," she thought out loud, spinning it in her fingers as she stared at it.

"... Sure." Apparently, they had trinkets like that on Earth. She wasn't sure why an object had the same name as a sound, but she couldn't be bothered to care. It clearly couldn't shoot or cut anything, so it was useless. She turned her attention back to the bow and pulled the quiver out, quickly counting the number of arrows, then trying to count the number of wolves prowling down below.

Evaline stared at the whistle some more, noticing how oddly oddly shaped it was. Maybe it was... a dog whistle? She thought she had seen these before at the animal pen house to have them gather all in one spot, but she wasn't completely sure.

She sighed, placing the whistle in her pocket for now. Grabbing the attention of the wolves or any other predator was the last thing they needed right now.

"So, I assume you know how to use a bow and arrow?" she asked Jerica below, not even doubting that she'd know something as archaic as that weapon.

"Considering I'm General of the Archers?" Jerica scoffed. "I've shot an arrow or two, yeah."

She slipped the quiver over her back and grabbed the bow, doing a practice draw. It was... fine. It was clunky and awkward and not at all like her bow. But she'd still trained with shitty weapons like this, so it'd be fine.

Jerica jumped off the branch, landing with one foot on the branch she'd been sitting on before -- then jumping down to the one below it in a fluid motion. Still carelessly jumping limb to limb without thinking too much about what was going to happen if she lost her balance. Because she wasn't going to lose her balance.

She leaned forward, wrapping one leg all the way around the branch to stabilize herself. She reached back and grabbed an arrow, then notched it and looked for the first target.