The Thundress // Chapter One: Beast of the Forest
The young girl walked slowly through the forest, spotting rocks and picking up the biggest ones she could and placing them in her burlap bag, one by one, stacking them onto each other and leaving only a bit of room in her bag. A clacking sound started to follow her around as she picked up her stride and the rocks clattered together. Her little feet thudded with confidence and a dash of arrogance as she trudged through the forest, pushing aside the giant leaves from the nearby plants. She walked through the unmarked path, leading herself to an open area filled with fruit trees burgeoning with Ai Dola. She walked over to one of the giant trees and adjusted her bag so that it was wrapped around her back and not in the way. She crossed her arms while gazing up at the trees. The girl scurried up the tree and plopped herself right down on one of the upper branches, shading herself from the glaring sun that peaked through from the canopy of the forest. With her feet dangling off the edge of the branch, she took just a second to catch her breathe and take in the surroundings. She stood up on the branch. It was thick and heavy enough to support her weight. She leaned forward with her hand covering her face, peering forward before, veering to her left and right. The hesitation in her movements belied a cautiousness of her surroundings. Her nerves were on edge and her senses at their highest peak. She seemed to be waiting for something. Seeing that nothing was out of the ordinary, she decided to drop her guard for the time being.
To her delight, a group of Ai Dola were growing directly above her. She stood on her tippy toes, trying to reach for them, but she was too short and her arms weren’t long enough. She walked across the branch, balancing herself as if she was walking across a tightrope. She wrapped her arms and legs around the tree trunk to try and climb up higher so that she could attain the delicious fruit. As she climbed the tree the bark nicked her legs, leaving her with small cuts that bled lightly. The girl was too hungry to notice the pain. As she climbed drool fell from her mouth back to the branch she came from. Finally climbing up to where the fruit were, she stopped and stretched as far as she could, grabbing onto the fruit nearest to her. She plucked it right off the branch and stared at it for a while, grinning from ear to ear. Her bag was now positioned in front of her, and she put the fruit she had just grabbed from the tree into her small satchel. She kept picking at the group of fruit until her bag was full and then shimmied her way back to the branch she had climbed up from. Without hesitation. she plopped back onto the branch, leaned up against the tree, and relaxed. She reached back into her bag, pulling out one of the fruits and wrapping her tiny hands around it. Full of anticipation and hunger, she snapped off the green leafy cap of the fruit that shielded it from the sun and started to peel off its deep blue rubbery skin. (She had always been told not to eat the skin because it was hard to digest and could cause serious day-long tummy aches. And yet, despite this, the skin was very sweet, so the islanders would cook the skin in certain dishes before throwing it out so that it left a delightfully saccharine smell and taste. Certain animals are able to eat and digest the skin without needing to go to the trouble of cooking it–they find it just as sweet as people do.) After getting the cap and skin off she set them beside her on the branch. Still drooling, she lifted the fruit towards her mouth and took a huge bite, revealing the familiar ruby red insides. Juices gushed out of the fruit and with a look of pure joy on her face the girl squealed out her pure contentment over the sweet, tangy taste she enjoyed so much. She finished the fruit and then ate two more since it was past noon and she was starving due to skipping breakfast.
Once she had finished her meal, she collected the caps and skins that were sitting beside her and tossed them below her directly into the center of the grove of trees. She grabbed her bag with the remaining fruit in it and leaned back against the tree until she was as cozy as she could be. She thought to herself how nice of a day it was. There wasn’t a single cloud in the sky. Or at least she remembered there weren’t any when she was still on the beach. Now that she was in the forest she could barely see the sky. The canopy of the trees covered it and only a few little rays of sunshine found a way to peek through. Feeling a bit tired after devouring so many of her beloved fruits, she was feeling a little sleepy and decided to take a nap. She laid her head against the tree and the birds that lived in the forest around her sang her to sleep.
The smell of the nearby ocean wafted into the forest and mixed with the sweet smell of the fruit creating a divine perfume. While laying there asleep, the young girl’s nose twitched. Another scent that she was all too familiar with had snuck in, ruining the perfect mixture of the ocean and Ai Dola. A faint musty smell rode in from the light southern breeze. The girl’s eyes snapped open “Finally…” she murmured under her breath. Getting up slowly, she crawled towards the middle of the branch and perched there on all fours in wait. Her bag that was once resting on her stomach was now slung across her back. Her guard was back up; this was no longer a time to rest. She focused her attention on the open area in front of her where the remains from the fruit she had eaten earlier sat, smelling sweet and tempting. The musky smell that woke her up earlier started to get stronger. The smell made its way through the forest, coming closer, accompanied by the crunching of fallen branches and twigs that were being trampled on. The young girl’s eyes pierced into the bushes straight ahead of her as she waited, completely still and silent. The smell got even stronger. The crunching got even louder. She started to hear the sound of heavy breathing and loud grunts. Her eyes stayed focused on the bushes in front of her. The bushes began to tremble and shake with the ground around it. All of a sudden a snout covered in black thistly hairs poked out of the bush. It flexed wide with its hairs standing up. Whatever was attached to the snout caught a hold of a smell of the Ai Dola and was determined to find it. The rest of what was attached to the snout appeared from inside of the bush. Two large ivory tusks poked out, long and sharp enough to pierce right through the flesh of little girls if they weren’t careful. A pair of beady blood-red eyes followed. They seemed like they held all of the anger the beast ever experienced in its life.
The girl continued to watch in complete silence as the monster stuck its head out of the bush and looked around cautiously, its mouth hanging wide open with its many teeth showing. A huge pink tongue was dangling out of its mouth and whipping around as it walked out and revealed itself in whole. It stood still for a bit just panting. A putrid mist escaped from its mouth with every breath it let out. Its body was covered in scars from previous encounters with hunters–rewards for making it out alive each time. Where scars did not cover its body short black hairs did.
The girl watched the beast and marveled to herself at the size of it–It’s huge. A lot bigger than she had thought. It stood about four and a half feet off the ground, almost a whole foot taller than herself. It also seemed to weigh more than six times her own weight. She continued to eye it as it lumbered towards the Ai Dola peel. Its short thick tail whipped back and forth. The beast’s hooves left a trail from the bush to the fruit. It took one last look around and before it moved to devour the skin. With every bite it snorted, it’s tail flipping back and forth even faster. Animals loved the sweetness of Ai Dola skin, even including this massive, ugly beast. In fact, it more than loved the skin–Ai Dola was its favorite treat. It was very rare that the monstrosity ever got to eat it, however, since it could not reach them in the tree and could only wait until the fruit fell out of the tree or it found remains from some more agile creature.
The girl watched the beast eat for a little longer until it was completely oblivious to its surroundings. She grinned from ear to ear, leaned forward a bit and whispered to herself “Here we go” while leaping from the tree with her arms and legs spread out and her bag full of rocks and fruit flailing in the air behind her. She fell right through the air and landed on the back of the beast. Instantly, she wrapped her arms as best she could around its thick neck as she struggled to hold on. The beast was startled and tried its best to shake her off while running through the forest. It ran and ran but she continued to hold on to its neck while her body swayed back and forth. She tried her best to twist and snap the beast’s neck but it was just too big and she didn’t have the strength to take it down with her bare hands. It ran through the forest, bulldozing right through all the plants and bushes, scaring all of the other wildlife away. Finally when it reached its highest speed it jerked its body forward, sending the girl flying into a tree as she lost her grip. She tumbled towards the ground, her arm bruising where she hit the tree, and her turquoise shirt and brown shorts dirtied.
She popped right back up and brought herself to her feet, displaying her youthful durability. The beast stared at her, resorting to its most primitive sounds of intimidation, but she showed no fear. The girl stared right back into the beast’s carmine eyes that looked as if they had finally overflowed with pent-up anger and she was the one that it was about to unleash its wrath on. It huffed and puffed and started to charge directly at her, running as fast as it could. The girl kept her back against the tree and stood still. The beast got closer and closer, but the girl continued to stand perfectly still. At the last moment, with the beast’s tusks only inches away from her stomach, she jumped out of the way, leaving the beast to impale its tusks into the tree and trap itself. It struggled and squealed as loud and hard as it could but just couldn’t find the power to get free. Standing next to the beast while watching it try to free itself, the girl smirked. She picked up her bag and started to twirl it in a circle around her head, the air thrumming as it gained momentum. When her bag had gained so much speed that she thought she might lose control of it she pivoted her foot back, jerked her shoulder forward, yelled as loud as she could as if conjuring up all the power in her tiny body, and smashed the bag of rocks and fruit against the head of the beast with all of her might, immediately concussing it. Its horns snapped, bits of them still stuck in the tree as its body slumped over and landed on the ground. The girl stood over the beast with a proud look on her face.
This is a story that I’ve always had in my mind called “The Thundress”, it is a very long project that I will periodically be putting up new chapters for. Hope you enjoyed!
