Chapter 1- The Beginning of it All
I felt a burst of cold air when someone took the warm, loving covers off me. “Stop!” I yelled, trying to pull the covers back from whomever took them from me. “Hannah banana, it’s hiking day!” I heard my dad say, as hiking was his favored passion. “Why today? I had the best dream, I was jumping on cotton candy clouds and there were waterfalls of gatorade.” Gatorade was my favorite drink on the entire earth. “We’ve had this planned for three months! Why couldn’t you have saved that dream for another night?” he said as he was sitting down. “Daaaad, you can’t have or not have a dream, silly!” My dad replied, “ Yeah right. We have to get a move on if we want to get to our hiking site by 10:00! Start packing your hiking bag Hannah! Chop chop!”
As I was packing, I was wondering what to bring, but I didn’t want Dad to get mad at me for not knowing what to bring, so I brought: a six pack of Gatorade, some Band-Aids, and a couple of granola bars. As I was about to exit the front door to wait for Dad at the car, I felt someone stop me. I turned around to look at who it was and it was my older brother, Lucas. He is a total caution freak, so he handed me a keychain with flint and steel and a Swiss Army knife starter set with scissors, a variety of mini knives, a mini saw, and tweezers. Then I hugged him and walked to the car, as I saw Dad was in the car, ready to leave.
While I was in the car looking out the window, I saw car after car race by; it looked like they would never end. As I felt the car slow to a stop, I readied my things; for the adventure awaits, I thought. I opened the car door not wanting to feel the cold air, as it was the middle of fall. I got out of the car, and Dad was already next to the entrance path, to the hike. I didn’t know then, but this hike was going to change my life.
We walked through the path slowly, taking in all that was around us, breathing in all the floral, outsidey scents. We looked at all the plants, gawking at animals. Hearing birds *Chirp Chirp* every step of the way. We were walking for quite a while, an hour or so. Then, we came across this little area with what looked like never-ending berries. There were so many berries, heaps and buckets worth. I took a couple of blackberry-looking berries and stuck them in my mouth. “Dad! These are delicious! You should really try some!” I said. Dad replied with a, “No thanks, I’m not very hungry,” answer. “Well, more for me!” I said enthusiastically while shoving some more in my mouth.
We walked a bit more until I felt my stomach was not feeling up to shape, so I told Dad, and I sat down on a log. I drank some water and exhaled.
Chapter 2- The Hike
I hear birds sing. I smell all the same outdoor smells. I open my eyes. I put my hands out in front of myself. I see them. I sit up. I am still on a log. Everything seems normal. Until I notice. Dad. Where is he? How long was I out for? I say my thoughts out loud. I get up. I am stressed. I get stressed easily. Calm down. I walk around the log for a couple minutes. Wait. I see something. What is it? I bend down. I grab it. It’s a note. It says Hi Hannah, I am very worried about you when you passed out. So I am going to find some help. I won’t take long. Probably only around 30 minutes. I will be back soon, don’t worry… Then at the bottom of the letter was Dad’s signature. I read the note carefully, making sure not to skip any words, on accident even. Once I finished reading the note, I placed it in my pocket, making sure not to crumple it.
I looked around again, focusing on my surroundings, seeing what I would have to deal with for only about half an hour. I saw the sun get dimmer, and I looked up and saw that the sky was gray, filled with clouds. I thought about how not prepared I was. I sat back down on the log, in silence for about four minutes until I realized; I was hungry. I grabbed my backpack, it was leaning against the side of the log. I unzipped it gingerly, how the one of worst things to happen was the zipper to get stuck. I pulled out a chocolate chip granola bar, and with the backpack on my lap, I ripped open the granola bar as I took in a big whiff of the chocolaty, not-very-healthy granola bar scent. I took a big bite of it. Mmmmmmmm. I closed my eyes for a second to take in the granola bar’s glorious taste. I did really miss my dad though, I’m almost never without him, except for school of course. I also started to worry a bit, it had been four hours since I passed out. I didn’t know how time had passed so fast, then I thought he might be in trouble! Oh no! Maybe I should go venture for him! I grabbed my coat,backpack, and Dad’s note and set off to find him!
I went up a hill, a very, very, very, very, very, very, VERY tall hill that completely exhausted me, but I kept going forward. I also came across this raging river, there was no way around it, so I found this big, long tree that must have fallen over, so I walked right across it. Then I got, now fully exhausted and I saw this big cave that was kind of hidden. It did look very welcoming though, and it was starting to drizzle, so I went inside. I didn’t want to get wet.
I walked through the cave, although it wasn’t really that big, and found a little nook, so I put my backpack down and laid on it. It had been a very long day and I was completely exhausted. I didn’t have a mirror, but I knew I didn’t look my best. I could feel the bags under my eyes. I closed my eyes and quickly fell asleep.
Chapter 3- BATS
I saw my dad, in a meadow with daisies and dandelions with his arms open, waiting for me to run into them. I skipped across the meadow until I reached him, but when I did, he melted into nothing. I awoke with a start, I looked around, nothing had changed, no Dad and still in a cave.
But then something caught my attention, something had moved quickly. It had darted across the cave. It was a small cave but whatever this thing was, it was fast. Around three minutes later, I had lost interest in whatever it was, so I put my head down on my bag again, but I didn’t close my eyes this time, I still was a teensy bit curious to see what it was that had disturbed me. Then I saw it again and again, like there were 50 of them! I got up and stood in the middle of the cave to see what would happen, and then I saw it. Out of all things of what it could have been, this was what I least expected. A bat. I was no expert on bats, but this one looked poisonous. It had white foam coming out of its mouth, and its eyes were bright red and yellow. I had to get out of there. Then it came at me, it was chasing me! I tried to swat it off with my backpack, but it wouldn’t go away!!! But then I got one really clean shot at it and after I hit the bat, it fell to the floor. But what I didn’t know was that there were a bunch more of them staring at me, they looked like they wanted revenge, wanted to avenge their bat friend (or family, I don’t really know.) Then, one darted at me and bit me! “Ouch!” It didn’t hurt too much but if all of them bit me once, I would be in excruciating pain. I scurried out of the cave, bats attacking me, adrenaline pumping. But thankfully, one by one they started to lay off on me though. I safely (sort of) got out of the cave and sat down on a nearby rock. I started to look at my wounds, they were nothing bad, just a couple of scratches and bruises. I went onward, to look for Dad.
Chapter 4: The Ditch
I was doing great, just walking and drinking Gatorade, when suddenly, I felt really lightheaded, I also felt I could throw up at any moment. I was really dizzy, faint, and unsteady. I felt terrible. I didn’t know why this was happening right then or there, it was all so out of the blue. I mean, I did also end up alone, in a forest, seemingly all by myself. I sat down on the nearest log, but I was so out of balance that I fell off and blacked out.
I awoke with a start, my head still spinning, but I wasn’t near the log anymore, I was somewhere else. Then I heard a voice. I thought I was going crazy. How could there be someone here? I’m alone. (Or so I thought.) Maybe it’s an angel telling me I can finally rest. But no. I heard it again, like it was getting closer and closer until…I saw him. It was Dad! I found him! “Oh my gosh, Hannah! Are you okay? I’m so glad you are okay!” I looked at Dad, we talked, he was definitely a bit beat up, but other than that, he’s a tough guy. After a while, I finally came to the end of answering all of his questions about EVERYTHING, but now I had a couple of questions that I wanted the answers for.
“ OK Dad, a couple questions. Where are we, how did you get here, how did I get here, and how long have you been here.” He answered with, “We are in a big ditch in the ground. How I got here, I was looking for help for you and then I twisted my ankle on an oddly shaped rock and fell in. How you got here, I didn’t see much from inside this ditch but all I saw was you rolling and falling into here.” I cut him off, “Oh and by the way, I think why I rolled in here was because some really scary bats bit me when I was in a cave that I found and I think that they were poisonous and I fell off a log I was sitting on and then I fell off because I came unconscious.” “Awwww, my tough little girl!” He said while giving me a big bear hug. “OK, last answer, I have been here for maybe about like,” He stopped for a moment to think, like his memory of outside of this ditch was blurry. He squinted his eyes so hard I thought they could pop right out!!! “I really don’t know Hannah banana, I’m sorry.” He said it very sincerely. “It’s OK Dad, but now here comes the biggest question of them all…how do we get out of here?”
Chapter 5: The Plan
Me and Dad talk and talk for hours, thinking of the plan, until we figure it out. I get my backpack and eat the last granola bar without thinking of Dad, although I do offer him water. Then we are ready for the plan. I get onto Dad’s shoulders, then awkwardly he lifts me up onto the edge of the ditch. Then, my hand scrapes on something. “OUCH!” I lose my balance while trying to go one-handed because my other hand was bleeding. I then fell back down, though luckily, landed in Dad’s arms. “Ow.” I say. “You okay? Want to wash it off with some water?” Dad says sympathetically. “Not a bad idea.” I say back to him. I then go to find my water bottle and then realize, I only packed Gatorade. Although I know it might hurt a bit, I take a bit of Gatorade and use it to wash some of the blood off. It stung…a lot, but it did wash all of the blood away. “Ready for take two?” Dad asks, in position for me to get onto his back. “Sure.” Then I get onto his back again, and heave myself up and over the edge of the ditch. “I did it Dad! I’m up!” I shouted happily. “Alright, now tie a vine or something to a rock, I think I saw a big sturdy rock right up front.” I walked around a bit looking for a vine and then I found one on a tree. I rip it off and hold it up to admire it. A perfect length vine. I tie it as tight as I can to a big rock that I found and threw it down to Dad. “Heads up!” I yelled. “Got it! Can you help pull me up? You won’t be doing all the work though, I will mostly pull myself up.” Dad says. “Yup.” I get my hands on the vine and feel Dad pulling me down. But then, I get a burst of energy and I pull as hard as I can, and next thing I know, he’s out of the ditch! “Wow Hannah, have you been working out?” He says, mocking me. “Whatever.” I say sarcastically. “So, what do we do now, Hannah?” “Let’s get out of this place!!!”
Aftermath
Hannah and her dad make it out of the woods safe and reunite with their family. Hannah and Lucas become closer than ever. The bats that Hannah came into contact with were vampire bats. They aren’t real vampires but in real life they do bite. Hannah’s dad gets help for his ankle and it heals fast. Even though that whole catastrophe was over, Hannah was scarred forever. She does go to some therapy to help with all of her deep thoughts.