Lost in the woods

Merida was in the forest, she had been there for days now but she wouldn't have been able to say how many days. She had been able to survive: she had drunk from the river and she had haunted with her bow. She didn't actually remember if she had ever done it, but she had the bow and the arrows with her and she found it pretty natural so she could suppose she had. Well that part hadn't been too dfficult, but something else had made her contemplate the possibility of the suicide: her visions. Since she had woken up they had kept come and go. Sometimes she was able to understand if they were just vision, or at least to guess: for example, when the fire appeared for the third time she was almost sure it was just a vision. Still, it didn't scare her any less. And the most part of the time she just didn't know. In that moment she had no visions, or at lest so she thought: she was in the woods, around her just the green grass, the trees and the blues sky...

Cale was out in the back yard taking a breath. He found that he needed to get out alone more often then before the curse started. Honestly while he liked the solitude he hated having to leave Jas and his sister.

He plopped himself down on a tree stump. He rubbed his faced as he tried to stay calm. Every time he started thinking about why he had to leave his favorite girls he got so angry. He took some deep breathes trying to learn to control his anger.

Merida was just sitting quietly, enjoying the absence of weird, dangerous or scary things, while she heard a noise: steps. Was that real or not? She wasn't sure. She didn't even know where she was exactly, if there were people around there or just ferocious beasts. As quick as she could she moved away, in the shadows, just in time to see a boy emerge from the woods and seat on a tree stump. She looked at him in fear. Was he real or not real? He was the first human she had met. Again, real or not real? What was she supposed to do? SHe didn't know, and she was scared...

Cale turned when he heard something moving in the woods. With all the weird changes happening around the town he couldn't let little things go. There was a chance that someone might attach him.

He saw a flash of red in the green foliage and moved forward looking around carefully.

"Hello? Is someone out there?"

Real or not real?
Real or not real?
When the boy raised up and started to approach her, she got that she couldn't know, but she couldn't as well afford to be wrong.
He could be dangerous, and he probably was...
She jumped on her feet and quickly armed herself with her bow and an arrow, ready to be shot. She was trembling, her whole body shaking slightly, and her eyes was big and her pupils dilated in fear, even her breath was heavy.

Cale saw some fast movement where he had spotted the red. Suddenly he saw a sharp arrow pointed at him. He was already feeling angry about what was happening around town so when he saw something that looked to want to attach him he sprang forward in his anger. He tackled a small body to the grounded and pinned what he now knew was a girl down.

"WHO ARE YOU?!?!?" He screamed in her face. "WHY DID YOU ATTACK ME!?!?!?!"

He moved fast. Too fast. And Merida was paralyzed by the fear: she wasn't able to shoot the arrow, and when the boy jumped on her and pinned her to the ground bow and arrow fell on the floor, useless.
And then she saw it: blood. Blood everywhere. Blood on the boy's body, in his hair, falling from his mouth on her...
She screamed, her eyes even bigger for the terror, and tried to wriggle, but she was too weak to do so, and she was shaking like a leaf.
"NO NO NO NO NO..." she was scared, terribly scared, and while she was shouting, tears started to fall from her eyes

As the girl screamed Cale felt his head throb. He had to get her to stop.

"SHUT UP!" He screamed as he shook her. He was feeling so angry about everything he just wanted to take it out on this girl that tried to attach him.

She actually stopped to scream, just a low moan kept coming from her mouth while her, closing her eyes to avoid to look at the blood, curled up on herself as much as she could, almost not noticing how the boy was shaking her. She took her head in her hands, sinking her nails in her own skin, scratching herself and moving her head like she was insane, tears still running down her cheeks

Now that the girl had stopped screaming the throbbing in Cale's head was lessening. He slowly stopped shaking her.

He then grabbed her chin forcing her to look at him. "Hey open your eyes." He demanded. When she didn't and continued shaking he became more demanding. "NOW!!"

She barely noticed that the boy has stopped to shake her, but she realized better when he raised her head. He ordered her to open her eyes, but it took a while for her to elaborate his request and only when he shouted at her she obeyed: he looked at him with her big eyes dilated, filled with fear. She seemed crazy.
But the blood was still there, dripping from his face.
She sobbed and closed her eyes again, scratching her forehead until it bleeded and moaning in a painful tone "It's not real, it's not real, it can't be real, it's not real, it's not real..."

When she started mumbling he felt annoyed. "What isn't real?" He growled into her face angrily.

"The blood... all the blood... make it stop... make it STOOOP!" she started moaning in a low tone, but soon her voice raised until it became a scream. She closed again her eyes, sinking more the nails in her own flesh.

Her rantings about blood surprised Cale so much his anger just seemed to float away. He looked at her with confusion and calmed down himself.

"Hey hey calm down Red." He said in a calming voice. He pulled her arms away from herself so she won't keep hurting herself.

When the boy talked quietly to her spreading her arms, pulling them away from her head and stopping her from hurting further herself, she raised again her glance, opening her eyes with an alarmed glance. She stared at the boy in fear, but after a few seconds she seamed to calm down a bit
"It's gone... it's gone now..."
The blood wasn't there anymore. The boy was just a normal boy.
And suddenly she felt tired, really tired. Breathing heavily, still trembling, still with her arms in the boy's hands, she rested her hurted forehead on the boy's chest, closing again her eyes and trying to calm down.

Cale patted the girls head as she rested her forehead to his chest. Her hair was crazy and tangled the wind blew it up into his face.

"It's ok Red. It's ok." He tried to shush and calm her.

Merida remained in that position for a few moments, then, when her breath had normalized and she had stopped to tremble so much, she raised again her glance and looked carefully at the boy
"You are real... I can touch you..."
the way she said it sounded almost as she was trying to convince herself of that, but she still wasn't totally convinced

Cale pulled back brushing some of her hair from her face.

"Yes, Yes I'm real." He patted her head gently. "Your ok. I'm sorry I freaked out on you earlier."

She stared at him, absorbing the news: she didn't have any other way to verify, so she had to take it for true.
He was real, then.
At his second phrase she looked down, frowning "It was... the blood... so much blood..." the memory gave her a chill, and she shook her head to avoid to remember.
Was she ok? "I... I don't know..."

Cale looked at her confused. "Red there was no blood." He told her gently. "Hey you want to go to my house? I have a lot of spare rooms that you could use." He told her.

She looked again at him: was he serious? Was he actually offering her a place? Did... did she have a place to go? She probably had had one, but she couldn't remember, she had been only in the woods...
So she nodded. Yes, she wanted to go with him. If he was dangerous... too bad, everything seemed bad and dangerous, she had probably died a terrible death in every case.
Then she frowned again and looked at him, like realizing in that moment that she had kept calling her 'red'. She didn't mind too much, but her name was one of the few things she actually remembered... "My name... my name is Merida."

He nodded and stood up. He pulled her up with him gently. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

"My name is Cale. Trust me a lot of weird stuff has been going on the last few days. Everyone seems to have some kind of problem now. I seem to be having some uncontrollable anger. My sister has lost her voice. All sorts of things." He wanted to make sure she knew she wasn't alone in this.

"Cale..." she repeated and nodded, raising up with him. She listened him talking about what had happened to him and other people, and nodded again "the green bats..." she whispered, more to herself then to him "I... i lost my memory... i think... and I started to see... things..."

Cale nodded in understanding. "Yeah the bats busted in on me and my.. um my friend Jas." He walked her gently toward the two large houses, which were his and Jasmines. "My sister was at a party. Do you know what you were doing when they attacked you? It might help you remember something." He suggested trying to be helpful.

She listened to him and nodded once again, following him toward the house. Then she frowned, trying to remember "I was running... running away from... from... something..." she frowned even more, but as much as she tried she couldn't remember why or what she was escaping from.