Cured (12 page)

As I sat and pondered my death I became aware
of a rustling in the bushes. I pounced to my feet, instantly alert.
More rustling. I spun around, facing the direction of the sound and
slowly backing away from the source. I grunted as I backed into a
thick tree trunk, and slowly edged my way around it, until I was
entirely shielded from whoever or whatever had made the sound. I
stood, absolutely still, not daring to blink, and breathing so
slowly that I was certain I was about to pass out. I stared at the
cluster of trees in the direction of the rustling, squinting to
make out shadows in the darkness. It must have been five minutes
before I dared move an inch around the tree trunk to get a better
view. As soon as I shifted, a loud crunch of dried leaves sounded
underfoot. Then there was a similar rustling sound echoing my own
from the cluster of trees. Perplexed, I shifted again, and my own
shuffling was met with more rustling from the direction of the
trees. Okay Avery, I tried to calm my nerves. I needed to think
reasonably. If it were a mutant lion making the sound, surely it
would have advanced on me by now, and it would not be intelligent
enough to mimic my movements. Ditto for any other animal. I
concluded that it must be human. But were they a friend or foe? Had
the test-makers planted enemies in the forest, maybe mutants to
hunt us down? Or was it Felix, just as scared as I was. By the time
I had run through all the possible options, and even more time had
passed, I was exhausted and my legs were falling asleep. I clenched
my fists and swallowed. Man up Avery.

“Um…” I squeaked. “Felix?”

“Are you kidding?!” came a gruff reply. “Are
you seriously THAT stupid?”

Suddenly irritated, I sprung out form behind
my tree. “What do you mean stupid?! Come out of there, Felix. I’ve
had enough.”

There was a crunching of leaves as Felix
moved from his hiding place, and finally his dark shadow emerged
and advanced on me. He came closer, until we were a few steps
apart.

“What the hell, Fe? You had me freaking out.
Why didn’t you answer me when I was calling your name?”

“Shut up for once in your life. We are in
forest full of lions, you total moron.”

Hold on, I frowned. That voice was too low.
That shadow’s shoulders were too broad. And that person was too
mean to be Felix. I squinted in the dark, trying to make out the
figure.

“THEO?”

Oh no, I groaned. Not ideal.

“I thought I told you to shut up.” came a
gruff whisper.

“How did you get to my area?” I asked.

“I’ve been running for miles. Just wanted to
test the new legs. Reckon I’ve done about thirty k’s and I’m not
even tired.” He was smug.

“Mm same...” I thought of my meagre fifteen
and cringed at the though of running double that distance.

“Anyway I’ll leave you to it… got a lion to
find.” Theo started striding away from me and I couldn’t help but
snort with laughter at his overly manly façade.

“What are you laughing at?” Theo spun around,
crunching more leaves underfoot.

“You!” I snorted again. “You’re seriously
going to pretend that you weren’t peeing your pants in fear just
now? We just hid from each other for ages, and if I hadn’t called
out we’d probably still be playing statues. You were petrified… of…
of…” I collapsed into laughter.

“Of you. Yes very funny,” his voice dripped
with sarcasm and he started walking away.

I started to call out to him, but then I saw
a movement out of the corner of my eye. I stifled my shout and
stopped laughing immediately. The crunch, crunch, crunch of Theo’s
footsteps were muffled out by a louder rustling sound. This sound
was made by more than two feet, and was much closer to me than Theo
was. I kept my feet still but turned my head slowly in the
direction of the noise. Slowly gliding between the gaps in the
trees was a very large and dark shadow. The figure was not human.
It stood on four legs and was low to the ground. It was moving in
Theo’s direction, fast. A lion. I slowly bent my knees, crouching
to the ground, holding my breath and praying that no leaves
crunched as I shifted my weight. Once I was in a crouching position
I felt around the forest floor blindly, fumbling for something of
enough weight to reach Theo at a throw. Finally I plucked up a
small but thick stick and returned to a standing position. Theo was
moving away from me quickly, and the lion was picking up pace,
darting past the trees, I aimed and tossed the stick in Theo’s
general direction. It missed and hit a tree before bouncing off and
onto the forest floor. He started at the sound and spun towards
me

“You’re throwing things now?” he shouted to
me as I wildly gestured for him to be quiet, although of course he
couldn’t see in the dark.

“Real mature Avery Rose!” he continued. I
turned towards the lion shadow, which was now stock still, about
ten meters from Theo, and was crouched into a pouncing position. I
had no choice.

“Theo!” I screamed, my voice breaking.
“Lion!”

Theo shut up and stopped moving.

“Ten meters to your right!” I shouted
again.

The shadow began to emerge from behind the
trees, creeping towards Theo. Theo stood still, obviously in shock.
Without thinking I bent and picked up another stick from the floor
and tossed it as far as I could to my right. It hit a tree with a
loud thump and fell to the ground, crunching a pile of dead leaves.
The lion stopped in its tracks and twisted its thick neck towards
the sound the stick had made. It wasn’t much, but it gave Theo
enough time to spring into action. He leapt for the nearest tree
and began to scale it with such speed and agility that the action
seemed graceful and almost balletic.

I remained still. Only now realising that I
hadn’t thought this through at all. Theo was a Prime. Of course he
could get himself out of danger’s way easily. Upon finally deciding
that the stick was not worth pursuing, the lion turned back to
where Theo had been standing moments ago. Furious that his prey had
escaped him, the lion shook its shadowed mane and let out an
earth-shaking roar that echoed through the forest, ricocheting off
the tree trunk acoustics. My ears rung long after it had stopped. I
remained still. Not blinking. Not breathing. Maybe he would leave
and try to track down Theo, I subconsciously crossed my fingers in
hope. The lion tilted its head back and began sniffing the air,
slowly edging around in a full 180-degree turn, to face me. I
stiffened. My knees locked. This was it. The lion crept towards me,
hunched low to the ground, eyes locked on mine. I squeaked as
something hard struck my head, just above my brow. The stick fell
to the floor; why was Theo throwing things? I spent a second
applauding his aim, compared to my attempt just minutes ago which
hit a tree meters from its target. I looked up, and saw his figure
waving at me from the tree he had climbed. He wanted me to climb up
after him.

I mimed a shooing action, wanting him to
escape so that at least one of us survived. He must have
interpreted my dismissal as an attempt to get rid of him so that I
could keep the lion for myself, as his next action was an extremely
rude gesture aimed at me. The lion was now a mere three meters from
me. It crouched to the ground, ready to pounce. My mind went
entirely blank, no life flashing-before-the-eyes moment for me.
Maybe because I hadn’t done enough in my life worth thinking about.
I just stood, eyes squeezed shut, like a dummy, a deer caught in
the headlights, and awaited my death-by-lion. I held my breath. It
was taking a long time to attack. I slowly opened one eyelid. The
lion was looking up, its eyes no longer on me, but aimed directly
to the sky above him. I followed his gaze and saw Theo, standing on
a branch directly above the lion and pelting him with twigs. Nice
try Theo, I thought, but a few twigs were not going to prevent my
death. I mimed a throat-cut gesture to Theo, who stopped throwing
sticks and suddenly leapt from the safety of the treetops and
landed with a thud on the lion’s back, straddling the best as
though it were a bucking bull. He wrapped his arms around the
lion’s throat as the animal reared and threw his body around
wildly, trying to eject his passenger. Theo was trying to strangle
the creature, but the lion was too strong, its skin too thick, and
Theo looked as though he was beginning to slide off the animal’s
back.

In a moment of stupidity and sheer panic I
snapped a branch off the nearest tree and spun it around, pointing
the sharp, severed end of the branch away from me. Holding my new
weapon like a lance, I began to run towards the beast, aiming low
to avoid hitting Theo. I was sprinting by the time I reached them,
and slammed the branch into the lion’s side with full force. The
lion stopped moving briefly, confused by the attack, but clearly
not harmed by it.

I remembered the impenetrable skin that
Regina had mentioned just as Theo yelled,

“You can’t pierce the skin, idiot!”

“I know!” I retaliated defensively.

“DO SOMETHING!” he wailed.

I looked around frantically. I had no more
tricks up my sleeve.

“We need to blind it somehow!” Theo shouted
again. “That way it might stop bucking enough for me to strangle
it!”

I didn’t agree with this idea. If someone
blinded me, I’d be pretty mad. But I didn’t have any better ideas,
and Theo was my only hope for staying alive at this point, so I
pulled my jersey over my head, hoping that it might be able to act
as some form of blindfold. As I aimed to throw it to Theo, but I
felt something in the pocket. Two small objects fell from the
jersey as I tossed it towards Theo, and I bent to retrieve them.
Theo had received my throw, but dropped the fabric to the
ground.

“Are you freaking kidding me?!” he yelled
with evident bemusement. “I meant blind it by stabbing its eye with
the branch, not by tying a bloody blindfold around its head, you
total moron!”

I wasn’t listening. I had picked up the
charcoal and the small tube from the forest floor. I pocketed the
charcoal and examined the canister more closely. It was the anxiety
attack medication that Felix hadn’t taken. He was mean to take one
pill to calm him from a panic episode. I opened the container and
counted eighteen pills. Surely that was enough to sedate something
larger than a human, even if for a brief period of time. Theo was
still shouting obscenities at me as I tried to formulate a
plan.

“Seriously Theo just shut up a second!” I
interrupted his rant and he fell silent.

How would I get the lion to take the pills? I
knew the answer and wasn’t happy with it. I reluctantly took the
branch that I had fashioned into a weapon, and snapped off the
sharpest point. Theo watched from the lion’s back.

“Please..” he panted, clearly tiring. “Hurry
with whatever… your mastermind… plan is.”

I took the sharp point and reached down to my
foot. I then clenched my jaw and began to saw away at the blistered
heel of my foot. The skin came away reasonably easily, as it was
already loose from the blisters, but blood began to flow rapidly.
Once I had removed a sizeable chunk of flesh from my heel, I used
the skin to wrap up the eighteen tablets into a parcel. After
letting a decent amount of blood drip onto the pills as a cover, I
looked up. Theo was watching me perplexedly and the lion had
stopped bucking, and instead was once again sniffing the air. He
smelt blood. All at once Theo flung himself from the lion’s body
and dive rolled onto the ground, the lion sprung towards me, and I
threw myself as far as I could away from the beast, dropping the
flesh and sedative package onto the ground. The lion snapped up the
trap I had set out for it in a millisecond and began eyeing me up.
I crouched into a ball as the lion approached, my entire body
shaking with terror. Suddenly I was being lifted into the air. I
opened my eyes to find myself in Theo’s arms. He cradled me like a
baby whilst dashing through the trees.

“What the hell…” he puffed. “Kind of plan…
was that.”

I looked behind us at the fast approaching
lion. We were dead meat. I closed my eyes again. Ignoring Theo, and
readying myself for death for the umpteenth time that day. A minute
passed and the lion still hadn’t attacked. I decided that Theo must
have picked up his pace to outrun the beast. I opened my eyes and
looked over Theo’s shoulder. No lion.

“Theo,” I whispered. No answer. He was
concentrating on avoiding the densely packed trees.

“Seriously, Theo” I repeated.

“What?!”

“It’s… it’s gone”

Theo stopped running and lowered me to the
ground. He turned around, but no lion was to be seen.

“What the hell?” he asked again, but this
time the question was genuine rather than a stab at my
intelligence. I sat on the floor, cradling my injured foot. It had
lost a lot of blood during our getaway.

In an instant, Theo had removed his own
jersey and wrapped it tightly around my foot, applying pressure to
my wound and stopping the bleeding. We sat like this for a few
minutes in complete silence.

“Seriously, what just happened?” Theo asked.
“How are we not inside the lion’s stomach right now?”

I was feeling much better with the blood flow
plugged. “Did you outrun him?” I asked.

“I can’t have.” Theo replied. “He was gaining
on us when I was running at my top speed. He must’ve stopped for
some reason.”

I realised that my plan might have worked.
“Do you remember back at training when Felix had a panic attack?” I
asked.

“Yeah...”

“Well he gave me the tube of anxiety
medication to look after. There were eighteen pills left in the
tube. I put them in my jersey pocket without even thinking.”

Theo was quick to catch on with his enhanced
brain. “So you cut your own flesh and put the pills on it to get
the lion to ingest them...” he caught on.