Carried Away-Colonist!AmericaxIndian!Reader part19

Reader's POV



Clouds were moving in. You watched them crawl across the sky, dragging more heavy clouds and rain behind them. Rain could be very dangerous, and your chest clenched at the sight. It was hard to tell sometimes if gray skies simply meant gray skies, or if it was a precursor of a storm. So far, you’d been continuing your trek, hoping that no rain would come. Now though, you could see the rain in the distance. Unfortunate.

“Alfred!” you called, scrambling to catch up to him. He paused and turned around, waiting for you to fall in step. At the moment, you were using a deer trail to make your way down the mountain. They were rarely good enough for you to use, but when they were you were trilled. It beat climbing down rocks and working your way down steep hills of loose dirt.

“Yeah?” he glanced at you, smiling, to show he was paying attention before looking back to the tight path before him.

“The sky,” you motioned up past the trees. “Rain.”

“Uh?” Alfred paused, stopping and turning his gaze upwards for a look. “Oh. It does look like rain…”

“We need stop.”

“Probably. But it might not be that bad of a storm,” Alfred sounded somewhat hopeful but you quickly shook your head, squashing his hopes. You could tell the prospect of home was tantalizing him, and he wanted to get back to familiar ground as much as you did. But you knew rushing would not get you home a moment earlier. It could even cost you your life.

“No. We need stop. It look dangerous.”

Alfred sighed but nodded. “Okay I guess, if you say so. We have to get to the bottom of the mountain at least though. If this storm is going to be so bad, I don’t like the idea of having to weather it up here.”

“Alright,” you nodded, relieved he didn’t put up much of a fight. You hated disagreeing with him, but you had no intention of putting either of you at risk, even if it meant fighting him.
You began moving again, anxiously counting the moments as they passed. The wind picked up, whipping your hair around your face wildly and sending the newly grown leaves into a flutter. Too fast; the rain was coming far too fast and you were going far too slow.

“Hurry, you don’t have much time,” it seemed to whisper. “The storm is coming.”

A squirrel scampered across your path and disappeared into a tree. It was the first animal you had seen in quite a while. They’ve all already hidden away, you realized, growing more anxious. Animals had a sense about these things.

Alfred too seemed to sense the changing air pressure. The wind continued to blow, heralding the clouds that followed, and the air seemed denser, and carried the smell that always precedes a heavy rain storm.

“Hurry,” you urged, prodding Alfred from behind. He nodded and did increase his pace, but you still felt you were going far too slow.

“Please rain, please wait until we reach the bottom to fall.” Alfred cast a somewhat confused glance back at you as you said this, but you simply shook your head and he went back to focusing on the trail. The rain seemed uninterested in heeding your pleas. The wind grew stronger and every now and then thunder boomed above your head, sending jolts of worry down your spine and making you rush faster. Unfortunately, the mountainside seemed to continue stretching down forever.

Lightning flashed above you and you paused to watch the sky, as did Alfred. When you felt a drop of water hit your cheek your stomach lurched. The rain was starting and you hadn’t reached the bottom of the mountain yet.

Despite the raindrops which were beginning to fall faster each moment, the two of you continued your trek down the mountain. It was getting more dangerous already. The trail had turned to mud and the leaves you stepped on slid under your feet. Several times one or the other of you nearly fell, but you managed to avoid taking a tumble.

Suddenly, Alfred stopped. You were about to ask him why but you looked around him and saw for yourself. You’d reached the end of the deer trail. Before you stretched a nearly straight drop. There were stones that you could have used to climb down earlier, but now the rain had made them slick and it would be far too dangerous to attempt.

“Oh…” you muttered. You would have to find a new route down now. Progress had been slow as it was, now it would be much worse, and much more dangerous.

“Well,” Alfred said, turning to you, “I guess we have to find a new way down now!” He smiled widely as raindrops rolled down his face and dropped from his chin. The look on his face was optimistic, but you could see the frustration in his eyes. He was tired, just like you were. It seemed your journey home would never end.

“No,” you shook your head and ignored the way his face fell. “Need stop. Find, um… Hmm,” you struggled to find a word that would fit but finally just settled, hoping he’d understand your meaning. “home place.”

“Home place?” He tilted his head and thought for a moment then started with recognition. “Oh! You mean a shelter?”

You shrugged, assuming that was indeed what you meant.

“Ah, but… I want to reach the bottom first…” Alfred sighed, turning back around to look down the cliff.

“No.” You would not budge. Death wasn’t something you wanted at the moment, and you could tell the storm would only get worse before it got better.

Alfred seemed to understand this as well and nodded, sighing. “Alright. Where do we hide?”
You stood for a moment, searching your memory for anywhere that might work. A few minutes before you remembered passing a large rock that curved out. Deciding that would be as good a place as any, you led the way back up the trail carefully. In the few minutes it took to walk there the rain began coming down in heavy sheets, making progress very difficult. It was hard to see, and even harder to walk. The ground was extremely muddy. For more than a week it had been raining regularly so the ground was already wet and streams, rivers and lakes were filled. But this was the worst storm you’d seen yet this season. You nearly fell over with relief when you spotted your destination.

The rock was twice as tall as Alfred and looked as if it had been used as shelter many times before, by animals and possibly humans as well. You nodded to yourself and made for the area that was protected. The overhang was nearly twice your arm-span and the ground was nearly entirely dry.
Alfred ducked in with you and for a moment you both crouched, watching the rain, breathing heavily and dripping. Though it wasn’t particularly cold, the air was cool enough that once you began calming down the water on your skin left you shivering. It felt like you’d gotten a beaten down from the rain and you were relieved to be out of it. However, you felt the relief drain a bit when you turned around to survey your little cubby. There was a hole in the rock which seemed to be a small cave. All of your senses tingled at this sight, screaming the possibility of dangerous animals. Alfred didn’t seem to have any issues with it though.

“Look! There’s a cave! This really is a perfect spot!”

“No,” you gasped, too late. The low grumble of an angry growl reverberated through the rock, only just loud enough for you to hear it over the rain. “A-Alfred,” you whispered, backing away from the hole.

“We could stay completely dry in there!” Clearly Alfred hadn’t heard what you had and crouched in front of the hole, preparing to go in. But he suddenly froze when two eyes appeared before him.
“Alfred!” you shrieked, grabbing the back of his shirt and yanking him as far away from the rock as you could. He scrambled to his feet and you were off, running and sliding through the mud. You didn’t know if the cougar had decided to chase you or not, but you weren’t about to look.

You ran like that for a while, slipping and sliding treacherously. It was exhausting and terrifying, but the knowledge that a massive cat could be chasing you kept both of you in motion. You plunged forward, unable to see much through the trees and heavy rain. It occurred to you that you were making much more progress in this wild plunging than you had before. Maybe you should run for your life more often; maybe you would actually make it home someday.

Suddenly, you placed your foot and there was no ground there. Your foot landed at an angle on the steep mud covered slide and you found yourself deciding against that thought. Running for your life at high speeds on dangerous terrain was more likely to get you killed than lead you home. You screamed, tumbling down the hill at high speed over rocks and branches and small shrubs. Alfred may have been yelling your name but you couldn’t hear over the sounds of water rushing past you and the blood running through your head.

A tree, small but fairly sturdy, cut your journey down the slope short. You gasped, attempting to regain your breath and clung to your little savior with all your might. Muddy water continually battered you and you were going to have a nasty bruise on your stomach soon, but you were alive. After taking the time to catch your breath, you carefully raised one hand and did your best to wipe the mud out of your eyes.

“_____! _____!!” Alfred’s frantic yelling finally pierced through all the other sounds and you attempted to glance back, but you couldn’t twist around enough to see him.

“I… Fine!” You gasped, as loud as you could manage. Having hopefully assuaged Alfred’s fear somewhat, you turned to survey your situation. There was no way you could climb back up without help and you weren’t sure if Alfred could provide help, since the distance back up was more than four times his arm span. But below you the muddy water flowed down and joined a much bigger river which was being filled by multiple outlets of rain water. Normally it was probably a somewhat peaceful river, but at the moment it was raging fiercely, sweeping away anything or anyone unfortunate enough to fall in. You were an excellent swimmer but it wouldn’t be wise to test your skills against the angry water.

There was a distinctly ominous splat above you and you twisted your head just in time to see Alfred fly past you. “Alfred!” you screamed desperately. Your eyes locked for a split second as he slid past you, and you made a fruitless attempt to grab his hand. Then he was gone. Everything seemed to be moving extremely slowly but far too fast. Alfred slid and tumbled down, hitting stones and branches but not catching anything, and then vanishing into the river.

“Alfred!” you cried again, but there was no answer. Worse than that, you did not see his head pop up above the water. Your eyes went back and forth, scanning the water, desperate for a glance of him. The seconds ticked by slowly. One; not there. Two; no sign of him. Three; where was he?! Four; he should have surfaced by now! Five; why wasn’t he up yet? Six; he couldn’t possibly - there! It wasn’t his head but it was something. Hesitating only for a brief second, you released your tree and carefully controlling your slide, plunged down the slope into the river.

Panic gripped you for a minute as you were swept through the river plunging head over heels and briefly losing all sense of direction. Where was up and where was down? You kicked around for a moment, trying to force yourself to remain calm. And then you were out. You gasped greedily for air, fighting desperately to keep your head above water and trying to establish a sense of direction. Once you had, you swam as hard as you could, hoping against hope that you could catch up to him.

The river washed you forward at a frantic pace and your eyes searched with desperation, even panic, hoping for just once glance of him. You twisted, narrowly avoiding a large stone settled firmly in the middle of the river, and for the briefest of seconds you saw a flash of Alfred’s golden hair. Keeping your eyes on that spot you dove, looking around in the water and swimming with all your strength, struggling to keep control. Vision under the water was extremely limited, but the spirits must have been on your side because you quickly spotted him.

Catching him was another thing altogether though. Every time you started getting close you ran out of breath and were forced to surface. Then you had to dive and find him all over again. After repeating this difficult process twice you finally managed to snag a piece of his shirt.
Using every ounce of your strength you managed to drag him to the surface, trying to focus on swimming instead of his limp state. You took a moment and simply breathed, holding him tightly to you and kicking just enough to keep both of your heads above the water.

Not far away you saw a tree stump that stuck out into the river but seemed to be fairly firmly lodged there. You threw everything you had left into a desperate attempt to reach that tree and the pain you felt in your back upon slamming into it was the best feeling you’d had all day. Releasing Alfred with one arm you grabbed onto the trunk with the other. It felt as if the river was trying to break your body as you struggled to both hold onto Alfred and the tree; the last hope of reaching shore you had. You hung there panting for a few moments then heaved yourself forward, one tiny inch at a time. When your knees hit a muddy slope under the water you cried out in joy. Dragging Alfred along with you, you fought and crawled your way onto the small shore, wet, battered and extremely tired, but alive.

As you lay there panting you felt what little remained of your strength drain from you as the fear was replaced with relief.

“Great Spirit,” you wheezed, no longer able to work up the energy to even lift your head. “thank you…” You closed your eyes, and before you knew it you blacked out.