Young Writers Society

Helenah laughed as she watched the others joined the sea of trees. Ruby was floating around too. Now the bird was just clutching Helenah's t-shirt with her little claws.

"Where to, leader?" Helenah asked, directing her question towards Lex.

"That way," Lex said, pointing towards what had to be the other end of the forest. He wasn't going to try navigating around the forest. The easiest way to get through it was cut right through - they needed to make a straight line from the river's end on their side to the other side.

Even though he had already been lifted by the lack of gravity, it felt strange trying to float across the seemingly endless forest. Some of the areas had less gravity than others. He found himself lifting up and then going back down as the gravity shifted again. It was never more than a few feet at a time, but by the time they were about halfway through the floating forest, they were nearly twenty feet up in the air.

And that was when he heard the first crash.

It was off in the distance behind them - a loud, crushing noise as something splattered to the ground. Lex already was beginning to get a sinking feeling in his gut before he looked back. But when he saw what was going on behind them, he was starting to realize why they hadn't seen any living creature here beside the very rare bird.

A tree had just suddenly been touched by gravity again.

And more were beginning to fall back where they entered the forest.

He couldn't easily make them out from where they were, but he could hear it.

And it was very, very terrifying to realize that the lack of gravity they had taken for granted could very easily squash them like a bug on the currently nonexistent forest floor below.

Kiran let out a strangled yelp.

Falling...falling wasn't a problem. Not for her. Gravity was...odd for someone made of the sky.

Her skin turned to rolling clouds, and a thunderstorm began on her forearm, spreading slowly upward as it revealed itself with the lightning arching in her veins.

The others weren't going to be fine.

She rubbed her sparking hands together. She could...she could...

No.

No, that would kill them. Humans were so fragile.

Her mind whirled with every possibility as she flew into a silent panic. Nothing. She could do nothing.

All that rising and falling had already spooked Aegeas; he'd been convinced that he'd hurtle down to the ground at any moment.

Now it sounded like that could actually happen. Great.

"What was that?" Aegeas said, wrapping his other arm around Lex's shoulder. The otter hadn't opened his eyes in a while, and he wasn't planning on it. "What was that screaming about?"

"That, my friend, is our doom," Rayden said.

He'd always thought about dying; but he hadn't quite imagined it'd be like this.
Okay, maybe he was being a tad too dramatic.

But still.

Faster, he thought. I need to make it out of here fatser. We need to make it out of here faster.

"We're going to be floating carcasses soon," he muttered.

Though this new danger wasn't as concerning for Dae as it was for the others, he still understood the severity of the situation, as well as the fact that it might result in the untimely death of his new companions.

However, just because he understood how serious the situation at hand was, doesn't mean he knew how to help the others escape it. For a brief moment, he was hit by a wave of emotions. He felt useless, scared, and most strangely, there was this feeling that could only be described as it's happening again. Even once he had recovered from this onslaught, that dull feeling of deja vu remained.

Whatever is was, he set it aside for later; there were serious things happening. While he might not know how he could help, he knew that there was someone who could figure something out. He flew over to Lex, shifting to his human form.

"Is there any way I can help?" he asked, a hopeful look in his eyes.

"I don't know," Lex said, trying to keep the worry out of his voice. He wasn't ever meant to be a leader - he wished the group would ask someone else for guidance, but he was beginning to think that he was the most qualified. And that, seeing he had no idea what he should be doing here, made him very, very nervous.

I wish Télos was here.

His god would know what to do.

But Télos wasn't here, so he had to figure this out on his own.

"We need to get to the other side of the forest soon," Lex said, "or find a way to cushion our fall when gravity comes back. Does anyone have anything that could do either one of those things?"

Helenah's face went pale when she heard the crash. Her hummingbird friend was shivering out of fear by now. Helenah could imagine why - having a tree falling on a little creature like Ruby would be terrifyingly painful. "L-Lex, ho-how much long-longer?" she spluttered.

I'll die today. I should've written my Will when I had the time. Please, God, please let me live. I'm too young to die. And I don't want to die in some strange world. God, please don't let me die.

She was getting chills all over her body now.

Kiran nodded, "I, uh, I might have something," she admitted, already feeling guilty at the false hope she was causing, "I can manipulate the weather. Big time. If I start a storm beneath us and, well, it's kinda complicated, but I can trick this place into thinking we're out of reach of the gravitational pull. It'll also get rid of a lot of the air," she added quickly, "which could be deadly. My powers are unpredictable in general and..." she trailed off. Her date-mate's voice echoed in her head, reprimanding her for rambling. She took a shaky breath, her eyes darting between the others. She shouldn't have said anything at all. Her idea would kill them. She was just wasting time. Time they didn't have.

"I'd take a chance of being dead instead of definitely being dead," Aegeas said. "And, y'know, if that lightning thing doesn't work out, I've been told I make a good pillow."

"I'm not sure," he told Helenah, trying to keep his voice as calm and comforting as he possibly could. He held her gaze for a moment before turning to Aegeas and Kiran.

"I think you should use your powers if we can't come up with anything else," he suggested. "Like Aegeas said, it might be dangerous, but this is even more dangerous than that."

She swallowed hard and nodded, "Yeah, yeah," she eagerly agreed, "The chances of death for anyone with human-like shock resistance and stuff are really, really high."

"And my fur would go up like a matchstick, but it could still be worth a shot," Aegeas said, trying to sound more confident than he felt. His voice was still a little too high-pitched and shaky for that.