Red Arrow

RED ARROW

Hearing the sound of water bashing up against her boat, there’s a weird motion at the back it s rocking, and it’s a not moving forward feel. Reaching for the hatch, she looks to the port hole. It’s still dark.

Peering out of the hatch she notices a huge formation at the bow of her boat. The sun to her left was starting to light a spark on the waters horizon. Shutting the hatch down above her, she turns to the photo of an old plane far off in the distance sky, surrounded by water. Etched on the bottom of the photo was 1935 Pacific Ocean, a photo of a woman wearing an Aviators hat, her goggles on top of it. Next to that was a mirror. She looked at both back and forth, there was a similarity, a feeling of strength, determination. She looked back at where she was sleeping, then back up at the hatch, opened it and proceeded to exit. Was that was a sign that it was ok to leave? She had no thoughts, no one talking in her head to guide her.

Her feet slipped on the boats surface exiting , hurting her hip. Grabbing the side of the wooden boat, she looked over seeing a foreshore. The ocean so blue ended and then started a pale sandy beach, with rocks all around. Including the rocks that had stopped her boat. Behind the beach was smoke and fire slowly drifting up all along the horizon, nothing familiar to her eyes. She turned to see the sun peeking through.

Her head started to ache, she knew about land but her previous concussions had made her head numb and void of thought. A sudden wind passed by her, a noise of something dropping at her feet. Like a slap on her face she looked down and picked up a black stone with a red arrow on it. In her hand it turned, and faced the foreshore. With no hesitation she went back under the hatch grabbed her back pack, glanced at the mirror and smiled. Exiting the boat with force she scaled the rocks towards the beach and swam the next hour towards land.

As her feet touched the land, there was a heaviness lifting out of the water. She looked out at the smoke, no vegetation in sight, desolation, fires still burning but at the edge of the water were 3 people waving. As her feet were sinking into the land, vivid pictures came to her of family. Who, what, were they her family? Dragging herself toward them, they were starting to disappear, And a voice entered her head. “Baby it’s alright, you can do it.”

Reaching the land she ran till she could no more and fell at what would have been the feet of the disappearing family. Her memory was vague, she felt empty, there was someone missing. She pulled out the stone from her pocket and in her hand it turned towards the smoky coast and knew it was her father guiding her. Laying her head on the sand she slept for at least an hour.

Waking slowly with sand on one side of her face she stood and brushed herself down. Still with her back pack on, worn out sandshoes denim shorts to her knees, sleeveless top and a strong zip up vest, that made a sound if you knocked it with your fist.

She looked back at the ocean, the boat still up against the rocks and the sun was about 10 o’clock shaking her head as the memories were flooding back with knowledge. She looked back at the smoking coast, back at her hand still with the arrow facing that way. Confused she felt a push from behind her. Then a huge wind came from behind her nearly pushing her to the ground making her run. The wind passed through her and forward leading a wide pathway, blowing the smoking ashes either side, she saw a blinding light that was so far away, but it enticed her to steady herself and start walking that way, she started to hear her father’s voice.

“If they can fly the oceans, so can you. The love in your heart was born from your fathers and mothers. I give my heart to you.”

Entering the winds pathway the sun was overhead. Feeling the heat either side she struck a fast firm pace that she knew she could keep up as long as see needed. “Baby it’s alright, you can do it.”

The Sun was in front of her by now heat from the edges of the pathway still edged her forward. As well as the stone arrow in her hand. Her mind was fleeting thoughts back and forth. A war plane, people running, screams the splashing of waves against the boat. 1935, that’s it she starts to think about where she saw that on the picture in the boat. A vision of a cave surround by dense forest, a hand reaching out holding a white gold chain. The light, getting brighter right in front of her.

The sun was nearing dusk on the horizon before her and that light suddenly shot above her head. The smoke and fires were closing in on her and the pathway was ending. She looked up at the light and it and it fell straight past her nose and down through the ground. Taking off her back pack she pulled out a small shovel and started to dig. The sun going down, darkness surrounded her she kept digging till she heard a metal sound. Brushing back the sand, a handle showed itself. Flashing back to the hatch in the boat, she opened it.

A stairway went down into darkness lighting a match, watching it drop down, noticing at least 20 rungs on the ladder she proceeded down. Stopping at the bottom, lighting another match, her eyes saw shelving and a lantern, lighting the lantern with another match and holding it up, the underground bunker was small. There were a few items on the shelves, a tiny gun, no bigger than the palm of her hand, no bullet in the barrel. A copper cut out of an olive branch and a bound leather pouch with a star cut into the top of it. Tired and drawn she drank her last sip of water from her back pack and rested her head on it as a pillow. Sniffing the damp dusty bunker she slept.

With praying hands resting under her face, she opened her eyes and saw the stone resting on its edge and the arrow facing upwards. Jumping up she fastened her back pack on her back grabbed the stone and the leather pouch. She went back up the ladder, opened the hatch. Smoke and fire still surrounded her, darkness and the sign of the sun starting to rise above the horizon.

Lowering the hatch she sat upon it felt and proved it was a safe place to sit and open the leather pouch. It was tied with a leather strap, crossing over the star. With one swift pull the strap unravelled and the star lifted slightly revealing an entry. Reaching inside she felt a chain. Holding the chain, she slowly pulled it out.The vision of the hand and the chain she saw on the shoreline. It was attached to something, and it was stuck in the pouch. She had to pull on it and then reached inside to pry it off the edge of the leather.

Pulling out the chain fully it was attached to what looked like a double heart joined in the middle.

A flash of her father words hit her in her own heart and she held it with both hands, let out a heavy sigh. Feeling a clasp she pressed against it to open it. Inside was 2 halves of a triangle, they shone like diamonds. The sun was lighting the sky, and out of her pocket into her hand the stone was still facing upwards.

Standing up with devastation all around, she put the stone and chain heart in the leather pouch and into her back pack. She took the shiny triangles and held them back to back forming one single triangle. It started to shake in her hands so she cupped it so it would not fall and a light started to appear at the top of it. She looked upwards and saw clouds starting to form from afar, they crept towards her from all over and a clear circle appeared above her formed by the clouds. The light from the triangle beamed past her nose upwards through the circle. Not daring to look down for fear of being blinded she focused above. Darker clouds started to form amongst the white, the sky was disappearing but in the circle where the beam of light was shining through appeared a darker object engulfing the circle. The light beam seamed to penetrate through the object, and a loud sonic boom sent waves through the clouds in every direction. Lightning was spattering around the circle leaving a clear pathway for the light.

Still looking upward she thought of the chain the double heart, her father’s words, the plane and then a sharp sudden pain entered her heart. She clenched her elbows into her sides dropped the triangle and grabbed her heart. The triangle shattered beneath her and the light stopped beaming. Bending over slightly holding her heart she heard whispering voices. Look up Look up. Bending her head back seeing the smoke out her peripheral vision she raised her hands to the sky. With a blink of an eye she was lifted up by another beam of light, through the lightning through the clouds as if she were flying straight up.

Hovering in the middle of the circle with the dark object directly above her, light surrounding her she looked down. She saw how far she had come from the boat, a circle patch of the hatch she went down and reached into her pocket for the stone she turned and turned it there was no arrow.

Confused she looked above as she heard a metal creaking sound and saw the bottom of the object open up and a stair way above.

The End