Savannah Tour: Chapter 7

Sasha, June 3rd, 11:36AM

I saw a bunch of people rushing, trying to catch us. “Haha! We’re too fast!” I shouted.

I probably shouldn’t have said that, because now, they’re getting on vehicles. Motorcycles, cars, even construction machines!

“Quick, climb up the tree!” Delta motioned to the tree holding the coconuts.

I did exactly what Delta said, and so I climbed the palm tree. It was very spiky and rough, but I managed to do it.

“Hey, why are we climbing this tree? Couldn’t their vehicles just knock it down?” I asked curiously.

Delta scaled the tree, mumbling “Ow” every few moments. Once she was about twenty feet up, she stopped.

“Well,” she said, eyeing the ground below. “Looks like we’ll have to jump on them.” She picked up a rock the size of her palm and aimed. Her arm moved in a blur. She whipped the rock at one of the workers. It didn’t miss. It hit the worker squarely right above their eye, sending them collapsing to the ground.

We jumped on the motorcycle and drove off, just barely landing the jump. We picked up some rocks before we took off, so I tried to throw them while Delta was driving. Did I mention I have a horrible aim? I aimed for another worker’s eye, just like Delta did, but I missed. Instead, I hit the huge grenade stored inside of the truck! “5... 4... 3... 2... 1...” it read.

“DRIVE FASTER!” I shouted.

Delta kept her hard gaze focused on the road, driving as fast as she could. I heard tires screeching across the sand and engines starting up. She didn’t even blink when the grenade went off.

There was an explosion of smoke. I heard workers screeching like chimpanzees. Dark red liquid splattering on the sand, slowly oozing into the ground. It was probably the scariest sound I've ever heard in my life. Workers limped out of the smoke, coughing. Their vehicles were blown backwards.

As smoke wafted into the air, Delta pressed the brakes suddenly and sent us swerving towards a tunnel. I clamped a hand over my mouth to stop from screaming and tightened my grip on Delta’s shoulder with the other.

After we got out of the tunnel, we arrived at a campground, and I decided to take a rest, along with Delta, and really try to chill out. Chilling out was hard at that time. Goodness.

“I’ll watch for other workers,” Delta said immediately, hyperventilating. She caught her breath and picked up a few large rocks. Delta leaned against the tunnel wall, her shallow breathing replaced by utter silence and a steely expression.

“Okay. Please don’t get hurt! Right now, you’re the only one I have! Let’s rest and keep watch together.” I spoke, shivering.

Delta turned and nodded. She looked at her hands and winced. Blisters and bright red blood covered her palms. The blood dripped onto the sand, but she pulled a first-aid kit out of her backpack and covered the blisters and scratches with gauze rolls and bandages. For safe measure, she wrapped two layers of athletic tape onto the wounds and stretched her hands out, gritting her teeth.

“What the heck happened to your hands?” I asked, horrified.

“Climbing the tree,” Delta replied languidly with a light laugh. “It was a bit sharp, if I must say.” She rolled her eyes and picked up her rocks again. “And I don’t think the workers are coming after us. She peered through the tunnel at the sky. “And... it’s lunchtime! I’ll prepare some food.”

“Oh. Sorry about that, but *you* suggested climbing up the tree! Do you even have any food? I kind of ate them all. Sorry.”

“Yeah. I have more dried fruit and 4 water bottles. I also have a pack of crackers.” Delta organized my stuff and displayed the platter of food on the ground. “I think it’ll last us the week if we ration it. Let’s have two fruits and a few crackers right now for lunch.” She set a plastic plate in the middle of the two of us and filled one side with two dried fruits and crackers, and the same on the other side.

“Oh yummy!” I half-shouted gleefully. “But let’s go look for some more food. Tell me what equipment you have.”

“Flashlight, compass, your map, um... first-aid kit.” She listed off the items while counting on her fingers. “You?”

“I have water bottles, rocks, the horrible coconut, and a book about plants, herbs, and berries. Like how to identify them. I took it just in case.”

“Well, yeah, I have food and water too. I took a class in plant identification, so I’ll be good with anything not in that book.” I nodded to her backpack and picked up a prune, inspecting it thoroughly before taking a small bite and swallowing.

“Clean up. I want to explore.”

“Alright, I’ll pack it up for now,” I said. “We should go now, before it’s too late for dinner. I know a good place to look for some plants.”

“Hey, about that equipment. What about the 20 signs?”

“I forgot about those. Let’s leave some of our least important equipment here so we can stock our backpacks with plants and berries.” She discarded my map and a water bottle. “Do you think we need the rocks? I mean, if we run into any danger like the workers...” she trailed off, probably thinking of the explosion.

“Sure. Let’s make a slingshot. I still want to take all the stuff with us. I want to have an adventure! No going back!”

“Not sure that we can make a slingshot. We’ll just...” Delta paused, thinking. “Fling rocks with our bare hands.” She picked up the rocks I’d dropped and stuffed them into her bag. “Come on, stop talking. We must go find food before it’s too dark. I don’t want to use the flashlight’s battery too much.”

“But still, a slingshot! I have a rubber band that was supposed to be a hair tie. All we need to do is find a funny looking twig!”

“Alright, I’ll keep a look out.” Delta pulled me towards the forest. “Let’s go already.”

“Okay. Since you have rocks, I need a weapon.”

I looked around a pine tree and found a small garden stake with a pointed end.

“Gosh, I hope you don’t stab anyone with that,” Delta said anxiously. “I mean, not me, of course. Maybe any dangerous *who*s or *what*s.”

“Okay. I mean, were kind of used to it right?”

Suddenly, I heard footsteps.

“Oh, no. That better not be one of the workers... or like a black bear or something,” Delta murmured, holding her rock up, ready to throw it.

Mr. Ortega came out instead, but Delta was so startled that she threw the rock anyways, aiming for the forehead. It hit his eyes instead.

He always was easily mad, like the time when I accidentally splashed red paint on an elephant while I was painting a rose on the outside of the bathroom wall, (people thought it was blood, ran home and never came back) and the time I bit his finger, (I thought it was a chicken finger) but it was nothing compared to this right now.

Mr. Ortega was already annoyed when he came out and saw the two of us without the VIPs or the tractor, but now he was furious. He toppled backwards into the dense undergrowth. Vines curled around him, and mud splattered nearby trees. Me and Delta scrambled backwards, too shocked to absorb his identity under the layers of mud and vines covering him.

“Who are you?” Delta demanded, aiming another rock at him. “Hm?”

I breathed in deeply. “It’s... it’s... Mr. Ortega.”