FEARLESS

• Indianna Cornius-randall Cornius-randall, Grade 8
• Short Story
• 2020

Alone, cold and damp I lay with the soggy sand seeping slowly through my clothes. Shivering under the stars I waited in anxious anticipation almost completely holding my breath, terrified that someone would hear me. The turquoise torch tempted me, but I couldn’t lose. As scared as I was that someone would crush me underfoot I was rooted to the spot, my heart pounding blood into my ears. Every fibre of my brain was urging me to run, to go home, but I wanted to win. I needed to win.

I started crawling along under logs and behind trees to try and avoid being caught. All of a sudden... Snap! I stopped as a throbbing pain shot through my head straight down to my toes. No matter which direction I went, the pain wouldn’t go away. It was like I was chained to a wall. I struggled to hold myself above the soggy ground as I tried with all my might to free myself. Finally, the tugging stopped and the force sent me plummeting toward the mud… Face first. I may not have been able to bring a facemask, but I sure felt like I had one at that moment!

I had to quickly keep moving, my heart was thumping so hard it could burst through my chest, bark and leaves were flicking up as the whistling wind became unbearable. My senses were heightened, as I could hear people in the distance, but I knew they weren’t actually there. Frightened, emotional and worried, I kept moving and eventually, I could see moving lumps of my teammates. I was incredibly relieved that I had found them because I didn’t want to be left behind, in the middle of the night by myself, but now I had to become very strategic. All I wanted was to be home in my own bed, wrapped in my snuggly blanket of dreams.

The night wasn’t over by a mile, I snapped out of dreamland and began crawling again. I had to try and do a ghost crawl, which is something very slow and hard. My shirt, sleeves and knees were muddy and sticking to my skin. I was starting to feel insecure because I knew that the position I was in wasn’t great. Three people looked towards me and I had to quickly become camouflaged. I ducked and felt as if I was sinking into the ground. Then I realised that I was surrounded by ants, I knew that if I was seen I would let my team down, so I shuffled through the leaves and hid behind a tree so I could flick all of the ants off of my uniform.

I peeked through the little hole in the tree trunk and started planning where I would go next as if my life depended on it. There was a gap between two people that was around 20 meters, which wasn’t a lot in this situation. I knew that I would have to make a crawl for it!

One arm in front of another, followed by my legs, I slowly dragged myself across the ground, suddenly…. I heard a voice coming towards my direction. “Is that somebody there?” I ducked my head as quick as lightning. After a few seconds they looked away and I kept crawling forward in the dark. The only thing visible was the glowing flag.

Seconds dragged into minutes and then the fluorescent yellow flag was in reach, I forcefully snatched the flag out of the tree before anyone else could reach it. “I did it!” I screamed. Everyone looked up and a sigh of relief went through my body because I was with other people. Now, I just wanted to be in bed. It was 11 pm and I felt like I could fall asleep standing, my eyes were starting to hurt…