//------------------------------// // Bear Another Burden // Story: Stranded // by OConnerGT-R //------------------------------// Chapter Five: Bear another Burden Surprisingly enough the water tower was in a less dense portion of woods. No more snakes to be found and I was damn glad there weren’t any. However that didn’t stop me from looking up from my sister’s craftsman skills to check for any unwanted visitors. Thankfully nothing seemed to bother us. I moved myself underneath the water tower as it began to rain. As the old saying goes, when it rains it pours. Thunder practically shook Brave from the top of the tower. She landed next to me then took shelter as it began to hail. “This weather is insane,” I muttered as a flash of lightning went off in the distance. “Listen, Brave, I’m sorry about the way I treat you. I forget that you aren’t a little filly sometimes.” Brave let out a long sigh. Obviously, she wasn’t very excited to talk about this either, but we needed to. It took me a moment to realize she didn’t plan on saying anything back. The tower shook a bit more as water from the waterfall behind us slapped the top rather hard. “You know that if something ever happened to you and I couldn’t do anything to help, I don’t think I could live with myself, sis.” I couldn’t imagine what I would do if I lost her knowing I could have done something to help her. I looked away from Brave, “Look, just so we’re on the same page. It was either it or me.” After an excruciating couple of seconds I glanced at my sister's direction. My sister smiled at me and shook her head before turning away. I smiled back. “Hey,” she nudged me hard enough that I looked at her. “I love you too.” *** *** Two days later and a change of plans later, we finished our pipe system and it was running great. Upon discovering the watertower, we both decided not to chance the possibility of a defective rune and made the extra effort for the “safer” water. As much as it was tempting to use the shack as our new shelter, I didn’t want to wake up in an vengeful snake’s belly should it return. I had been playing with the radio every night trying to find a decent station to listen to...until it broke. So each day was partially spent either hunting for supplies, looking for safer shelter, or kicking back. That was until our pipe system suddenly stopped working, which meant we had to travel back to the tower. Brave cracked her neck to the side slowly letting out a groan of relief. Rolling her head a few times she managed to stretch it out. “Hey, so the other day when I was fishing in the morning I heard some gunshots going off somewhere on the mountain,” my sister stated with what sounded like a hint of worry. “Haven’t heard anything since.” “Maybe we should start moving inland a bit, see if there aren’t any towns nearby now that we’re finally set up enough to live off the land,” I reasoned back. A branch snapped in the distance making me draw back an arrow. After our encounter with the snake, I never let my guard down while we were even near the woods. A squirrel jump from one branch to the next while I put the arrow back in my quiver. Taking a glance at Brave, I found that she was unloading her crossbow. Something about us both pulling out our weapons at the same time made me chuckle. We continued walking until the tower came into view. Our walk came to a screeching halt when we saw what had happened to our pipe system. Part of the system had been knocked down from where the water was supposed to be feeding into it. The pump lying on the ground seemed to be functional, but that was about as good as our news got. “Oh crap,” I mumbled to my sister. From the look on my sister's face I could tell she wasn’t sure how to handle this either. Somehow, the hulking grizzly bear had managed to climb all the way up the tower to the tank, and in the process, knocked the pump out from the opening in the tank’s side, Shingles from atop the tower came crashing down around the grizzly while its paw thrashed about inside the tank. Whatever had the bear’s attention was clearly pissing the thing off as its growls became louder, making my heart sink. I had fought off several bears in the past. Smaller ones, by myself. Brave had been too young at the time and gratefully never had to deal with one until now. Still, I hadn’t walked away from those encounters without several character marks along my body. I had been lucky to walk away with my life. Thankful I had enough wits to outsmart each bear. This time shouldn’t be any different. Brave yanked me behind several trees, making me follower her up a small path leading to a tree by a ledge that overlooked the top of the tower. The wind blew past us while I held my hoof up to check the direction as it was best to stay downwind of the beast. If it caught wind of us there was no doubt it would follow us back to camp, especially with how agitated it was already. “Listen,” Brave whispered, “I’ll draw its attention while you take the high ground and do some long range shooting with that bow.” I peered around the tree, seeing part of the roof break off before it came crashing down against one of the tower’s legs, my heart began to race with the plan running through my mind. “No,” I said sternly. “I’ll be the distraction. You’ve got the gun so make every shot count, you understand me, and if that doesn’t kill it then we only have these bows.” There wasn’t a hint of fear in my voice. Adrenaline pumped through my veins putting me on edge. “I can do this, Starry, we’ve been over this!” she quietly raged at me. The wind brushed past us again as a low rumble of thunder went by. We were still downwind, for now. “You need to trust me.” “I am,” I spat back. “I’m trusting you with my life, Brave, because I know how dangerous these things are and you haven’t faced one head on like I have. Make every shot counter, you hear me.” Brave nodded reluctantly. “Fine, but if you get hurt, don’t say I didn’t offer,” she said softly. I jogged back down to the tower, where the trees could obscure the bear's vision, then drew an arrow back. Letting it rip through the air, I almost landed a well-placed shot in the bear’s back as the wind changed, sending the arrow off course and bringing my sister's scent with it. The bear looked up, searching, then started climbing. Its claws sunk into the nearby tree with similar claw marks, that continued upward right up to where my sister was loading her crossbow. Brave went to point both the gun and the crossbow as the bear pulled itself up faster than she could get to the ledge. Its claws swung out, forcing Brave to dive right over the ledge, but as she did so, an arrow levitated straight up into the bear’s eye, but not far enough to kill it. My sister came crashing down on top of the water tower’s weak roof, making just her spot collapse from underneath her. Water came splashing up over the rim with a fish that had been lucky enough not to have been eaten by the bear. Loud roars of agony mixed with anger caught my attention as the bear climbed back down from the tree with a partially broken arrow sticking out from its eye. Brave’s crossbow had landed next to one of the tower’s legs, but the gun was nowhere to be found. I scrambled up to the ledge as fast as I could, keeping tabs on the bear as it climbed back onto a now rickety tower with its claws swinging down into the tank. Brave had now become the metaphorical fish in a barrel with the bear serving as the gun. Without any hesitation, I jumped from the ledge, ditching my bow to the ground where the crossbow lay, allowing myself to land on the bears back. I lodged an arrow into the bear’s back holding onto the arrow with my teeth as I tried to sense the arrow in the bear’s eye. Once I found it I tried to push it in further but the beast reached up behind itself, pulling me forward then ramming my body right through the roof as I unintentionally pulled the arrow out of its eye. The entire structure shook as I hit the water inside with a loud splat. I groaned out in pain, trying to move to one side of the tank where the bear wasn’t clawing at us. Brave kept her gun levitated up then took a shot as the bear moved away. Her breathing rate had picked up as had mine. We looked at one another, carefully listening for the sounds of growling. My hope was that the beast has gotten tired of picking on stubborn prey. That was until its head came crashing through part of the roofing, its teeth being shoved almost directly in my face. Taking a quick shot, Brave landed a direct hit in the bear’s shoulder making it thrash into the side of the tank. A loud snap came from outside as the world around us began to shake until it inevitably tipped over. Water slushed around us, throwing us into the wall as the structure broke apart with us spilling out. The gun, which had conveniently fallen underneath some debris, was what we needed right now. Brave threw the wood and metal into the stream next to us, desperately searching for it. When she found it, she knocked it her way as she rolled towards it. Levitating the firearm up, she took a shot in the bear’s direction. My eyes began searching for one of the weapons while the bear continued to move. With three shots wasted, I spotted the crossbow and levitated it over to me, rolling back onto all fours at the same time. I fired a single shot that sunk right into the bear’s stomach. It shrugged it off then charged at me, swinging its large arm right into me. I hit a low hanging tree branch that broke upon impact, knocking the wind out of me. From out of nowhere the bear stood above me bringing its claw up to strike. Then, out of nowhere, Brave Day jumped onto the bear, ramming her knife as many times as she could into any weak point she found. The bear cried out in pain, ripping Brave from its back before slamming her against the ground. It swung its claws at my sister as she dove away, but she wasn’t fast enough. Fur tore from her body like it was wrapping paper, each claw leaving behind a mark as Brave hit the ground without a movement afterward. Her knife lay next to me. Screaming at the top of my lungs with fury I didn’t even know I had, my horn flared up,levitating the knife right into the bear’s good eye. The knife repeated to slam itself into the beast until I gave it the hardest buck to the face I could. Once I was sure the bear was dead, I turned to my sister. “Brave Day,” I shrieked in horror.