The Heart of the Forest

Posted on Tue Feb 22nd, 2011 @ 4:02pm by Lieutenant JG Elizabeth Jackson & Lieutenant JG Marek Lovok [Lynx] & Staff Sergeant Allen Riley

1,333 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: The Forests of Mythraeli
Location: Mythraeli
Timeline: Current

ON

Marek tapped his own combadge just to see if his worked. =^= Lovok to Calypso, =^= he called and got no response. He took it off his uniform and opened the casing; he pulled out the pin from its housing within the combadge and started playing around with the internal circuitry.

"You're welcome to try, but I don't think that's it," Lizzie said. "We're both having the same problem."

"Make that all three of us." Allen said as he tucked away his comm device. "SFMC frequencies are down too. Must be one hell of a dispersion field." He gripped his weapon a little tighter. "Might be hostile in nature."

Lizzie looked around. "I don't know. Scans showed nothing hostile before we left the ship. But something is definitely causing problems."

She headed in what she hoped was the direction of the shuttle. After a few steps she stopped. "This looks nothing like what it should. I practically live among trees. I don't get this confused. It's like I turned around and I'm in a different place."

Allen also turned around and frowned. "I hate to sound like an idiot, but I could swear this tree wasn't here a couple of minutes ago." He walked a few paces and place his hand on the tree trunk as if to be certain it really existed. He then looked down at where the teams footprints had lead. "Umm... are we all high or something? We walked in pretty much a straight line... right?" He pointed down to where the footprints were. The footprints all were all tightly together, but the path twisted and winded around wildly; much more so than the line they had taken.

Lizzie looked at the footprints. "You're right. It looks like we've been wandering all over the place. So, either everything is moving, or we're delusional. At the moment I'm leaning towards delusional." She looked to where the sun was sitting low on the horizon. "We should find someplace to sleep for the night. I don't want to wander around in the dark."

The Marine nodded in agreement. "I suggest we find a well hidden place for the night in case this really is hostile in nature." He held up his radio for reference.

Lizzie looked around. "What do you suggest? I'm all for climbing into a tree."

Allen looked at as if she had truly gone delusional. "We could try that ... I happen to be a fan of using the tent in my pack..." He loosed a strap on the pack he was carying and swung it around in front of him.

Lizzie looked at him for a moment. "I didn't bring a tent."

He looked at Marek and then back to Elizabeth. "Not a problem. I'm sure the Ensign and I don't mind roughing it. Besides, the ferns here look like they might make a pretty decent shelter. I can have one ready to go in under an hour." He pulled out the rolled form of a tent from his pack and handed it to her. "We could as well find our camp site now."

Lizzie took the tent, not quite sure what do do with it. "I do know how to sleep outside. I would be fine in the ferns, too. Unless it would make the two of you too uncomfortable?"

Marek shook his head. "I'm okay with it," he had put his combadge back together and it still didn't work. Without the resources of the ship he couldn't find out why the communicator wasn't working so decided to leave it and focus on surviving.

He eyed the other two. "You know what if the forest is actually reconfiguring itself?" He asked still unsure if he wanted to go down that road.

Allen looked around almost as if he had ignored the comment. "Well if it is," He said after a moment "then I say it's a mystery for another day. Right now I'm more concerned about setting up for the night." He then looked dirrectly at Marek. "We can figure out what the hell is going on here tomorrow."

Lizzie didn't want to get into a discussion about what may or may not be going on. Right now, she just wanted to find a soft place to sleep. "What's the verdict? Do we all sleep on the ground or do I have to sleep in the tent?"

"Well if your happy to share the ground with us then I have no objections and yeah I am sleepy so think we should turn in," Marek said.

Allen stuffed the tent back into his pack. "Shame not to use it if we have one, but okay." He looked around him at the foliage around them. "Well lets get our site set up. That tree over there has low lying branches, I think it will be as good a place as any to work with. I can start with the shelter if you two work on getting a fire going and our bedding?"

Lizzie looked at the tree carefully. "Okay. I can build a fire." She cleared a space in the clearing and then dug a hole before she gathered some twigs. The undergrowth was too soft and damp to provide proper kindling. Hopefully the twigs would work well enough. She found a couple of sticks and began to rub one on the other.

"Why not use hair?" Marek suggested before he added. "I'll look for some rocks to put around the fire to help it and more wood."

"We'd need a fair amount of hair and I really don't feel like pulling mine out, or having it cut off, thank you very much," Lizzie said. "But some rocks would be nice."

Marek glanced down and sighed. "Sorry, pitty I have not seen any animals that have fur we could use. I'll be back," he said and headed off to find rocks.

Lizzie looked up, horrified. "I wouldn't use a poor animal to start a fire." She went back to her stick rubbing. After a bit she was able to get a small fire going. It was pretty pitiful. The sticks were dry enough, but there wasn't any real tinder to speak of. Nor, surprisingly, were there any large trees on the ground.

"I meant the animal's fur ma'am," Marek said firmly as he had returned with two large rocks he place next to the fire.

Allen laughed quietly to himself over the exchange as he worked on building the shelters frame.

He too found it odd that there was a lack of fallen branches around, but he kept his comments to himself as there was just enough to do the job at hand. He used the roll of twine found in his pack to tie together the sticks in a weave formation. Once finished, he propped the lean-to against the tree and started tying in fern leaves for its roofing.

"Nice," Lizzie commented when the fire was burning strong enough to be left alone. The fire won't last through the night, but if we set it up right, we can start it fresh in the morning."

"Do either of you have any experience with hunting game?" Marek asked.

Allen grinned ear to ear and patted the side of his rifle. "Start running." He joked.

Marek jumped and made a running pose before settling back down on the ground. He smiled, "Well you will be the food gatherer then," he said.

Lizzie just shook her head and began to make herself a comfortable spot among the ferns.

"What?" Marek asked as he saw Lizzie shaking her head.

"Nothing," she said, grinning. "I'm not going ot comment. Or shoot." She spread out her blanket and lay down, watching the last burning embers of the fire go out. "Hopefully things will look better in the light of day."

OFF

Ensign Marek Lovok
Assistant Chief Engineer
USS Calypso

Lieutenant JG Elizabeth Jackson (PNPC)
Botanist
USS Calypso

Staff Sergeant Allen Riley (PNPC)
Platoon Sergeant
USS Calypso

 

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