(GE Copy)

Chapter 15: As Seasons Past, Come Turn, Turn Again. (Part 1)

“As a dog returneth to his vomit...”

The old man held out two sandals, which bottoms glistened with a vibrant green so lucid that it made pale of everything else around it. It’s darks were black, and it’s brights were blinding, smooth and highly reflective. Giving them to Aaron, Kaylemen said to put them on. The laces were a leather with encrusted purple speckles that both bent and stretched like rubber. Firmly, yet the elasticity seemed unending. Aaron wanted to tug on it to gauge it’s strength but feared having to replace the line once he had discovered it’s limit. They weren’t comfortable, but when he walked, it was like he was on air as the compression was instantaneous and without impact or vibration. It was silent, too. Tapping his foot against the ground, not even the board panels took an impact, nor even squeeked. He jumped, yet nothing. “Did you make these?” Aaron asked.

“Of course I made them.” Kaylemen confirmed. “Wouldn’t pay even a begging cup boy for cheap crap like that! NOW! Off ya go!” Leading Aaron off towards the edge, the old man pointed towards something that Aaron couldn’t quite see yet “Out there, plenty to find, there’s one, there’s another, you’ll be fine.” Aaron however, couldn’t see much when looking below, as he finally got a good gander at the bottom and was gravely distracted in fear. His whole body went limp with a pressure that built around him, a pressure that distorted sight and gravity alike. Giving him a nudge, Aaron’s body rolled over the railing like a liquid. Zack stood stunned.

Sophie ran up to him, staggering as the change in atmosphere nearly knocked her over backwards. “He can survive that, right?” She begged.

“Assuming he lands on his feet... Probably should have mentioned that part first” The whole air itself seemed to move back to normal at Aarons’ departure, and the pressure let off leaving Sophie and Kaylemen to marvel. “What a sheer power that boy possesses... Sure hope he straightens out that fall...” Muttering to himself before yelling out at the descending lad who’s screams were cut short. “Make sure to land on your feet!” But what garbled utterance that could be made out from Aaron as a response seemed to imply Kaylemen would have to repeat himself. “I said! Make sure... To land... On...” Coughing his lungs out at the exertion between words, even with his indoor voice “Even the ta... Talkbox ain’t... I’m getting too old for this.” Waving the lad off in his coughing fit. “I’m sure he’ll figure out what to do... First lesson, there we go! No, already had that, Second... No, the first, REAL lesson.” Laughing before coughing once more.

I’d call this a cliff hanger, but the lad’s well since past that at this point. Be glad I didn’t end the last chapter here...

A tear flecked off Aaron’s eyes as he descended. He had the lingering fear in the back of his head, considering if this whole ‘falling gag’, would become the new trend in making his life miserable. Surely the world couldn’t be that sadistic. The ripples of air rattled him deeply, and the wind made a sharp concision in his ear. As he looked up, he could see the place where his balls once where, as to say, the effects of ‘g’ force had quite the delay on his perception. A delay which thrust his eyes down to the impact below.

Large textile domes littered the ground floor, green and lush, with patches of sapphire water at their base. Aaron flailed his arms about, trying to reset his position but the force and pressure felt strong enough to snap his fragile limbs like uncooked pasta. For a time that could not be counted in his head, Aaron finally found a sweet butter zone for shifting his frail rag dolled corpse-to-be amidst the violent turbulence, and eventually set himself straight. Swiftly as the ground moved much quicker than before, the sight met him into a dark uncertainty. Did he survive, or was this the afterlife? He dared to open his eyes, as the ground had finally met him. Not feeling a single resistance, yet the falling had stopped. Looking down Aaron pieced it together “Oh... That’s why he gave me these shoes. Probably should have realized that, but...” Looking up, after the panic fuelled confusion had ended. “What an asshole...” Looking back at his footing, he was positioned in a perfect horse stance. It was an adept placement of footwork seen only in the dreams of black belts, and perfectly performed in every regard... Except that it’s a really weak stance in the first place and it got him knocked on his ass the moment the ground shook. I’m sure there’s a use for horse stance over the (much superior) bow stance, one that I’ve just not been made aware of; because like Aaron, I just keep finding myself on my ass.

The earth shifted, and the valley tops had tilted, or rather he did. Once Aaron began to slide, he took to realized his footing, or at least would-be footing was taking off. What a hoser, eh? Aaron looked into the lush green of an ancient stagnant pond, and held on in fear of falling into the mystery liquid. His mossy handholds however ripped out from the sockets, as the moist vine and vegetation were frail and tender. This raising earth came to a balance itself, and he could climb back up the greenery with a modest ease. Aaron Fell back down as a rumbled shook the whole air itself, and it rattled through his body like a roaring symphony of deep amplified bass. Soon he heard the crashing of water in the distance. Many, more of the textile earthen domes lifted up on their four legs and Aaron understood his own footing very well.

A hot pressurized air blistered out from the flooring through the hexagonal outline of grass and moss that was soon ejected from it’s back like a blunderbuss. Aaron felt it raise then lower, as the shell of this massive headless turtle pulled in the air through it’s back, breathing through the cracks of it’s shell. More lush shrapnel blew out from the surroundings. The herd had risen, lowering the pond’s water level substantially. They too roared with the dislodging of their clogged airways.

Aaron staggered along it’s back, dropping onto another shell below, belonging to a still slumbering turtle. The creature simply refused to wake. Aaron slid on it’s slick outcrop, frantically pulling himself to it’s top. Looking back, he could see the eyes inside the shell that he had just left, with a tiny face that was most disturbing. It’s mouth opened like a widening sphincter, ovulating ten sizes, and starving. Aaron climbed frantically and ran away from his initial landing pad as it leapt onto the back of it’s sleeping friend.

Aaron was forced to jump the gap onto the next. Aaron held onto the back of a yet rising neighbour, clinging to whatever he could find. In a miracle, Aaron found a vine which was stronger, however it’s verdescent floral skin would rip to a slick sappy rope underneath. He crawled the webbing of roots that he could coil over his wrists. Dense, and not very flexible, but they held half his weight as he pulled up on the lip of a shell’s hexagonal outline. This third turtle, the one that he was currently on, also unclogged it’s pours, and the blast hovered Aaron above it. He still held on in a desperate clinging of the massive woody root that his hands had just caught before the ventilation. Dangling like a carrot, the hungry hungry turtle behind him took to a snapping at Aaron and it’s short stubby head peeked out as much as it could. Aaron’s island didn’t take too well to being chomped at, and after a snap too many, the turtle Aaron was clung to spun around furiously. Poor Aaron, clinging to the rope until his hands could no longer hold him, was flung off feet first into the side of the cliff. Thankfully, still wearing the sandals, broke his fall and not his legs. And yes, from there, right into the drink.

Aaron watched the two fight over top the sleeping giant. Although, it wasn’t really sleeping anymore, it still couldn’t exactly get up while being used as a podium. The boy shimmied along the water’s edge. The cracks of the bedrock helped drag him through the old pond as he horked up the waxy swill from his nose and throat. A fowl odor, surely clinging deeply into his cloths for years to come. He dragged himself along until a shoreline was found, a break in the trees and a pass from the eroded valley which hopefully made it’s way back up. The stream out however, leading under the crag of a cavernous cove, was not going to return him topside anytime soon and he took to the piles of rock instead. Trees half buried themselves over time, as the overburden had claimed many feet of woodland stock in recent years. Fresh, ten year trees, consumed to the hip in mud and rock. Along some edges of the rock face were crevices and shallow hollows. He stumbled.

Aaron looked about, but the adrenaline had carried him up a tall steep slope, and his skidding shoes only reminded him of the cascading rocky plummet below. Scooting to the side, Aaron made use of the natural finger holds along the bare rock, to find one such to prick him. His first thought came to a bug such as a spider, wasp or other belligerent like creature. Aaron made sure to avoid that hole but when passing it by, albeit begrudgingly, he looked down to find it’s angry source, but instead found a glimmer. It was the tiny eroded vug, a hollow in the rock, with an even tinier little pink crystal stone inside. More carefully this time, he lowered his finger inside, pressing it sideways and in time it dislodged with no way of fitting two fingers in to grip it out with. Blowing into it was also a mistake. Don’t do that with your eyes open.

Aaron coughed. Up ahead was more similar holes and gemstones just as such popping out much easier with more finger room for nabbing. He stuffed his pockets, before coming into a clearing. It must have been sixty feet wide, walled by rough vertical stone edges with a lowered flat in it’s centre, and a large pillar of sheer rock that stood twenty five feet tall at it’s core. All the surrounding was jagged, and unclimbable. Just a plateau lower than the rim, overlooking his Gaian plaza like the spectators stand of a king and the sharp peeks above overhead even there.

One jackpot stood stiffly, jutting out from the splintered stone. A green rod, a couple of them actually, and more appeared to him as he climbed the chest high rocky mound of sharp layered bedrock beside the wall. There was no snapping these beauties from their holdings, not by hand anyway, nor was there any fitting of these goliaths in his pockets. There were however, a smaller patch he could try. Aaron pulled rhythmically on the bedrock, it’s striations and deep degraded layers of air had to dislodge at some point, giving it a wiggle. At last a large rock loosened for him, slipping out of his hands to crash into the ground and break up into further shards. Perhaps it was better to get the faults out of the way earlier rather than during the action of smashing. Aaron removed the largest piece of bedrock, which was the only thing to stand up to the webbing matrix hold on these vibrant green crystalline paychecks.

Aaron crawled carefully on top, feeling the deep grit of the razor edged rock. He took a slam of the hard stone against the green gems, which collision sent all momentum into an unnatural direction. It bounced the huge rock into the air, spinning out of Aaron’s hands and landing precariously beside him. Luckily not on him, but now it had been broken in half. Again. He chipped away at the matrix, and host rock underneath the gem, in an attempts to simply allow it to free so he could refine it from there. This went well, with a few snags a couple bites but in time all he could manage was a small thumb sized piece just to the left of his dream piece. He tried for the holds on the larger pieces, rocking and wiggling it away but his arms gave out. That and his ears were tired of hearing the ‘clinging’ echoes of the rock bounce off the walls.

He panted, noticing a movement overhead in the kings plateau. Aaron flicked his damp muddied shirt for a ventilation. It was a soothing cold which his body thanked him for and begged for more. The movement occurred once more, a large one which caught his attention fully. In his blurry vision, it seemed to be pouring itself off of the fifteen foot cliff, whatever it was. Aaron pulled himself off of the rocky gem covered seat and fell himself behind it out of sight. The grey mass landed into the arena, and a lion’s body roamed with the enlarged head of a coyote. Aaron was not having it, looking for his exit. Either the large steep slide into a pit of angry turtles, or the unknown den behind him.

The beast circled the outside parameter counterclockwise, slowly pacing with it’s eyes on the blind spots of the enclosure. The intelligence was uncanny. Just what Aaron wanted, another smart animal to hate him. It sleeked along towards his safest exit, systematically sweeping the area and leaving only the cave behind Aaron as a death pit. Aaron’s senses however, told him a different story: It came from the sweat and damp of his clothes, he felt the cold of a draft pressing against him from within the cave and without hesitation Aaron slipped into it still yet unseen.

Once out of sight he picked up his pace, for his footsteps were muffled by the green gems on his feet, much like those he was just hunting. He panted heavily into his shirt, to muffle his voice which echoed metallically upon the stone, even in all his efforts. He heard the roar, and knew to break for whatever exit he could find. Aaron staggered, as the softening shoes worked a double edge in removing most all sense of incline and his feet fell under him on the uneven ground. He could still feel the cold draft upon his skin, and knew a second exist existed. He could see a light up ahead, and a sheen of something between him and the dim hope. Aaron plucked whatever chips he could scrounge off of the ground as he leapt back to a sprint. The sound of whatever was trailing him, close behind, having caught the scent. He could see the highlights of fur in the darkness when Aaron scampered frantically out the exit on all fours. The light from the outer world was blinding, but he was back onto flat ground and easy footing.

Aaron dashed in for the trees. It’s roar now echoing, clearly past the breach of it’s confinement. Aaron could hear the rustling of a great stalker in high pursuit having difficulty with weaving around the trees with it’s thickly elongated body. Aaron’s nimble form could easily wrap around the wooden stalks on a dime, but his legs were much slower than the best, and he could feel it closing in even here. Aaron’s feet left the ground, as a tiny unseen bluff opened up underneath. Aaron rolled back into a full tilt before finding another, much larger drop open into a wide plane.

Without hesitation. he leapt the twelve foot drop into the shallow pond waters below. It sprawled a large field of savanna wetland. Arid grass stood all around, despite the plentiful ponds as all the bounty of fresh roots and tender shoots were consumed by the overwhelming heard of impala. Aaron ran past them, and the quadrupedal beasts fur stood on end, with their attention lead behind Aaron. The high pursuit of Aarons ‘buddy’ frayed the herbivores in a frenzy, running with Aaron to safety. This movement blended Aaron in with the chaos, and disoriented the predator with the rustles of dry grass blinders as they shifted about around the water holes. This fortune made the beast’s target, Aaron, seem to pop in and out at random, and mingled his scent with other delicious morsels. It stood upon the high mound to relocate the boy, and broke off to the sight of him.

Aaron could feel his heart beat like the hooves and clicking of the stampede. He passed by a large creature which jumped up and fronted Aaron. It’s hairy form was like a fattened stag, who’s locks of fur puffed out at him. Soon following came the pursuit of the grey coyote faced lion. It’s sleek, slender, feline shape contorted at the confrontation with the pack’s defender. The grey hunter, shifted it’s front to dash past and take Aaron but was thwarted at each rapid waver by the sentry, signing Aaron’s safety to the herd. As the guardian stood between them, the hunter called a bluff by moving closer, but soon realized the surrounding of a mob begin to form. The grey beast took a kiting around the target but the guardian stampered into the path and affronted the offence anew. Deterred, the hunter slipped off into the distance, as the braves of the herd emboldened their ranks to chase it from their midst and reform the parameter.

The guardian turned to the boy, and it came to him. His knees gave out under it’s overwhelming size and Aaron was at it’s mercy. The saviour nuzzled him momentarily before walking off with a saunter, and laid amidst the grass under the few scares trees to still exist in this plane.

Aaron rested. He looked in his clenched hands were the lucid blue shards he had picked up from the cave were still tightly latched in his stress. His fingers opened like rusted hinges to reveal a sharpened edge that had been napped and smoothed into a weapon. Even slits for a thatching to tether it amidst a handle. The last weapon of an unfortunate hunter; a dead man’s shiv. A tear ran down Aaron’s side once more, and he empathized with the poor soul who’s legacy was written into a pretty stone. A legacy that could only be read only by another fit with such trials, and may have otherwise been forgotten entirely. Revived momentarily only to learn of it’s death. Aaron, was all that knew now, or might ever know the reality of such fables that are lost to time. It’s napped clear sky blue edge was chipped, with a chunk missing; the piece where damage was meant to be inflicting, no longer. He had unknowingly walked side by side with the journey of another unknown soul, who ended their tale with a much sadder reality. All that remained was the sign, that failure of survival.

Aaron stood, storing the memento. Pink in his left, Green in his right, all he had remaining to keep separate these powerful catalyzing stones were the back pockets. Soon he’d have to invent a new means of storage.

The peace of the field was visceral as were it a breath of life. The moist and the calm, the vivid emotion and fading adrenaline. His eyes opened sternly, smiled and laughed. He was alive, and it took him this long to realize it. “How blind I’ve become!” Spitting himself a roar of laughter. “I’m so focused on these stupid fucking rocks, that I can’t even notice I just narrowly made it out alive. If I had one in my hand I would throw it...” Feeling the sore lump in his rear, and the stiff folds on his pockets while sitting down. “Too much effort to pull it out again...” Despite the feeling his of weak trembling hands, that could not reach inside the denim lip of his pants, they also felt strong; like a fire underneath the skin and the attentive focus that he lost. The grin on his face widened. “I’m alive...” Shaking his head. “I’m actually really happy about it... I...” And in this gratitude, a moment passed where he remembered the things he lost, and memories that became so often suppressed. In his waking moments, he felt alive. Knowing the more he chased these thoughts, the further they liked to slip away, he let them rest. Instead, he merely sat there, content; breathing in the breath of life, still remembering where his thoughts were, through the vague filament of his mind, but never quite touching them to read what was inside. All that mattered was that he knew that his memories were still there, and not erased. They could still be retried.

He watched the clouds change forms, and the grass sway. The birds who’s lives danced like shadows in the sky, played before him. The heightened smell of earthen reeds, and the moist air of ichor filled his lungs. “It feels like this is how life should have been from the start.” Aaron dismayed. “It’s fun to go out looking for treasures, but... I could find this peace going for a walk instead of throwing myself towards danger. This tranquility, this Eden is so much better than finding stones.” He exhaled deeply. “But, that’s still why I’m out here, isn’t it...” Looking off to the locals, he smiled harder. “And no one can hear me talking to myself, YOU CAN’T THINK I’M CRAZY!” He relished before finally getting up.

Aaron could feel the strength in his legs renew, and the senses within him tell stories he had long forgotten about himself. How the sensation of the emotions he felt now were strikingly different than the ones he had imagined from the safety of home and for once he enjoyed the visceral interaction with the unknown. Light itself seemed so much brighter than the eye could perceive and things long suppressed in fear, returned without the voice of uncertainty to squelch it. He had found the answer to a time before, upon the hillside while he was enraged in furious combat; but without the passionate of rage and anger, he felt a truer form of liveliness flow within him now and every sense was clear. Something he could understand. For so long, fear had consumed any rationality of himself, but for what that fear was of, he was still uncertain. He just cheated death, but there were more things to be frightened of. These fears, still buried itself deeply within, hid from him but for now he had overcome.

Looking up, he was alone, and free. The feeling of adrenaline was now only a fuel for passion. The world opened up around him and he no longer felt afraid. “If I wanted to... I could go there... or there, or anywhere...” Seeing the distant mountains. Somehow, he wanted to throw it all away for this one bliss and walk away into the woods forever; but Zack’s prophecy wasn’t going to come true just yet, as Aaron also remembered the goal that he was given: The life and friends he had established, everything he had come to know of this world turned his head, and Aaron passed the opportunity to continued his journey. Freedom could wait. He wasn’t entirely sold on being alone quite yet.

Aaron gave wonder to where he was, reinvigorated by the fire within. The hills from earlier seemed so distant, and much more different. Aaron studied the surroundings, from the valley onto the clearing, to the turns he remembered taking in the cavern behind the forest. Aaron had some recollection of which direction home was but wasn’t so certain when looking at it now. He felt the loneliness but his adrenaline wouldn’t sit him feeling entirely helpless. Around him was a new and open world and his curiosity continued.

Still, he though to himself as the fauna ate in guarded peace. “That creature’s probably lurking back a ways where I came...” Gauging the hillside he came in from. It tapered off into a forest, and a dip out of sight below the flats of grass where these lowlands fell back in. Probably towards the valley and consequently home.

It couldn’t all be so convoluted as Belship had warned about, “Everything here looks so real.” Walking the parameter. “If I can out think Belship’s description, then if I walk here...” Following his paces to the side. “It’s because I chose to... Right?... Who else could have been here, for this exact reason, and if I encompass this stone, I can see it from all around without travelling to another world, right?...” Shaking his head. “This is horse shit, I’m questioning the reality of the world that I can see it with my own two eyes. This go right to turn left crap, is bullshit, home is that way.” Settling on the path which seemed to bring him closer to where he wanted to be, rather than where he came in from. But where we came from, is not always a physical direction.

His flats bowed down the hill into a shallow valley to where a stream had once ran. After rocky obstacle and chest high climb walking along side the river’s side, Aaron opted for the rocky, yet stable, riverbed bottom instead. He could still see over the edge of the berm, but that observant luxury wouldn’t last forever. This dead creek became uneven and the bedrock peeked through the gravels. Surely where there was once flowing water, there came a glimmering glint in the ground. Aaron bent down to pick it up, but the stone was too cloudy and far too marbled with dirt to be of any use. Beyond that, there was no latent energies, none he could feel however.

He heard the snapping of a dry twig, raising his head to seek it out, but found only a large bird taking flight from the sound’s source. Still uncertain Aaron carried along.

The walls risen onto a deep pit and his apprehension was like a knife to stick him with paranoia. The walls eventually receded again, leading into a bend that had widened the bed with gravel and girth. On the shallow lip of a small forgotten island, was a boulder and a line of whithered bush. In among it was a collection of divots but none to bare any gems like before “I know I said that I’d be tossing stones but... Here I am, looking for more...” Signing at his reluctant crystal lust, “Again...” Still having cast eyes on his trail ahead, his mind constantly loomed around the uncertainty of his safety. It must be far enough to have met or ditched his stalker from earlier, but Aaron would not loosen this guard in case any creature wanted to play the long game with him.

Aaron followed this dried waterway onto a rocky slide. At his current height, he managed to score himself sight on a lovely plateau just up the side of his bedrock enclosure. The cracks along the wall face were an easy hand hold that frankly Aaron desperately needed in order to climb. Making it to the top, he smiled, incredibly his strength was slowly increasing over the last month. Kneeling before a colourful deposit, Aaron thought to where he would put such fat little stubs, definitely not in his last back pocket, they wouldn’t stretch to accommodate that much. Improvising, Aaron quickly removed his shirt to use as a basket. He felt a crawling along his back, and if you stood below you could make out a six legged spider looking creature being chucked very, very far off the top of where Aaron stood. Everywhere you go, there seems to be something crawling out of the woodworks, little schmucks. Well, if there was anything around to hunt him, he defiantly rang the dinner bell with that shriek he made.

Tying off one of the arms, he locked it with a safety pin that was laying around in his pocket. Something he somehow had been fidgeting with a few weeks ago, and still survived the washing machine spine drive. Aaron filled the arms past the shoulders and tied it off before the neck, creating a pouch with room still left within it. Aaron gauged the landing, as to not incite any more stowaways, and took the hard landing with a bending roll onto a rocky sheet. The smooth warm sun beaten rock graced his shoulder, and Aaron remembered the joys of movement; like when he’d jump off tall objects in his room to the floor below until he was so tired he could no longer stand. “This growing up stuff ain’t so bad, getting to do these crazy things mom’d never let me do. It’s a lot better than hopping off the dresser too.” Hanging his makeshift sack over his neck, across the shoulder, Aaron muttered “I’d really hope whoever’s been messing with my head is finally giving it a rest.” It seemed like for the first time in forever, he was free to remember the joys in past, when normally, they were a fuzzy distant shape as though they might not have even happened. Now, he could see it clearly, and he smiled. How could someone forget all those fun times he had?

Aaron took his path in along a bank, where an assortment of lovely translucent stones laid, all of which were useless. He seeked out for the energies that he had felt before, but they hummed with not a single shred of power. Not that Aaron really mastered finding it. He could feel the radiating stigma in his cloth sack but not much of it’s visceral components within these cloudy shore specimens. These pretty river run rocks, like the quarts and chalcedony from home, were just a pretty stone and nothing more.

“I really can’t help it can I...” Tossing the paper weight aside. His ears perked, no noise, but his attention fled onto his entrance. Aaron stood staring lifelessly for a few minutes until noticing the sun had nearly made it to the hillside treetops. He was going to be running out of time at this rate.

Aaron had walked so far that the path home seemed to disappeared from his recollection or even the understanding of where he was right now. The only landmark he could see from earlier was this dry stream that slalomed continually downward. Aaron dreaded the thought of returning to ground zero, especially as there was no chance on the rock climbing back to the house at the summit. Despite all his physical improvements, Aaron had recently come to know this climbing weakness rather intimately and it wasn’t an option. All he could do was hope for higher ground and to take any opportunity for a good view point. The palisade of sheer cliffs around him here, offered no such benefit in arms reach and eroded a dusty dangerous climb otherwise.

He could hear a slighting of sand beside him. Aaron swung himself away from it, bracing his arms towards the sound. The reaction causing a startled response from his watcher. It was a great dane sized hunter, fattened with a flat canine face and dirty jet black fur. It’s prowl flinched but quickly as it’s nerves were reset, it came to pounce towards Aaron in a dive bombing from it’s lodgings.

Without hesitation this beast sprung from the ground, narrowly missing but still caused Aaron to stumble and fall onto his back. The landing nearly winded him, but the shocking gasp evacuated his lungs before the impact and inadvertently saved him. It leapt for him, but instinctively Aaron lunged his legs against it’s body, forcing it back upon his firm backrest. Aaron rolled backwards, onto his knees, stiffly making a stand by the time the creature had time to reach him. Aaron kicked but the hunters’ teeth dug into his sole, and yanked the shoe from his foot. It seemed distracted, long enough for Aaron to retract his other shoe as a deterring shield. Leaving the salty human flavoured leather shoe behind, it prowled anew, looking for an opening. Aaron could feel the grit of gravels clawing into his footing and knew there was no running with such frail feeble feet.

It came for another round, taking a lunging for Aaron’s neck but met with a perfect shield press to it’s face. The impact unfortunately, and all momentum if you remember how these stones work, fell flat out from under the beast. Aaron kinda forgot about that, however, it still stunned the creature by the belief it should have felt something smash it’s face in and didn’t. Before it could connect what happened, Aaron’s instincts lifted his knee, and rabbit kicked it’s body off kilter as it fell. A loud scowling cry echoed through the valley and it collapsed against the rocky ground beneath. Winding it temporarily to a quite prideful whimper.

Aaron retreated for his other shoe, you know, his only hope for walking home with such sharp objects under his weak heels. Rising again, the assailants’ second limping attempt at food continued. It’s body tilted with the aching impact, protecting it from further damage. As it swiped for him, Aaron blocked each blow with the green shield, felting the well of confidence within him. He saw it, the perfect opening of it’s over compensated movements to avoid pain, the shifting of it’s head for a perfect knockout. Aaron tensened his arm, making for a straw baler against it’s temples, and landing a powerful blow with the green gems that killed all bloody freaking inertia, again. Aaron didn’t seem to learn all that much from the last one, did he? As this did nothing but get him closer, the beast that overthrew Aaron, plopping him in his hiney. It clung to his leg, biting through the fabric of his denim, dragging him along the ground. Aaron fell the hammer, dropping his heel into the bastard’s nose. It’s huffs shot snot along Aaron’s leg. Unable to breath normally, the beast risen it’s teeth from Aaron and gasped through it’s mouth for air, sneezing uncontrollably.

It growled, but could not maintain the bluff as Aaron returned to his feet and encroached on it’s space in retaliation. The cowering hunter was left to retreat. It stood at the hillside, but nothing a few good rock tosses couldn’t fix, and it took off.

Proudly lifting his flag of victory, Aaron bent to refix his shoes to his aching feet and took his stroll onward. All his wounds numbed and the pain was static. Sharp, grating static, but he felt uncharacteristically strong that these abrasions were more than tolerable than ever. He was a man now; still a dweeby ass kid, but damn if he sure didn’t feel on top of the world. The pain almost fed him, marvelling at his strength. He felt unstoppable, not so much because he won, but that he understood how to defend himself. Every turned seemed to be going for him, and he shaved off another layer of fear that held him down.