Falling

• Oliver Henshaw, Grade 6
• Short Story
• 2014

The sense of zero-gravity consumed me like a pool of oil leaving nowhere to hide and nowhere to run. My heart was pounding, the ground was getting closer and closer. I found myself praying for the best but I knew it was no use. The ground was like an impending doom reaching out to me, poised for the kill. I decided to count 3...2...1. Everything went black.

I dreamed of how this tragic fate happened to me. Ajax and Wilton, my buddies, are all members of the SAS. We had been planning this trip for months just us, out here in the wilderness. Ajax was the strongest of us, he had always been a natural warrior. Wilton was our survival expert. He started off life as a farmer but then joined the SAS to put his uses to the test. I was just the glue that held us all together. We all had our stories to tell about our own heroic deeds but we have heard each other's about a million times.

We were driving down an old beaten track off towards our destination a campsite which only few people go to each year. We pulled over and asked Ajax why we had pulled over and then I saw it: a gap 3 metres wide and about 20 metres deep. Wilton, being 'captain obvious' said, "Woah something bad happened here." We were concerned because no sooner than Wilton made his statement the ground started shaking lightly "you guys feel that?" Ajax said in a gruff voice. "Yes" Wilton replied. It became more violent, throbbing, like a giant heart. "Get to the car!" I yelled.

We clumsily made it to the car. The shaking was more violent than ever; the car could only just handle. Then a cracks were spreading rapidly in an web like labyrinth. Ajax hit the gas and I went flying back into my seat. The cracks grew wider and the ground felt like liquid, always moving churning back and fourth. Soon the cracks grew too wide to cross and the car got stuck. We jumped out and ran. We ran until we couldn't run anymore. We were exhausted. We had nearly cleared the cracks and we tried to make the final jump. Ajax went first, then Wilton, and then it was my turn, I jumped but I didn't land.The ledge had broken. Ajax and Wilton were falling with me and we all knew this was it.

I woke up to a world full of pain. I looked around. One of legs was bent like a banana, a sure sign of a broken leg. I tried to stand up but yellow spots danced in my eyes. I fashioned a splint out of a piece of branch that must of fallen from a tree. I stood up but the pain had subsided. I could walk, but not very well. I had no clue how I had survived the fall but I knew what the next task was, survival.