Helena Chu (lostchu) wrote in thefield, @ 2009-07-14 13:51:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | angelica, helena, z - 1st tribe - day 28 |
Surprise Intruders
Who: Helena and OPEN to anyone at camp during the attack of the dogs.
When: Mid-Morning
Where: Her lean-to
What: Sustaining an injury and giving one back
Rating: TBD
Helena had gotten up with the sun and dug a fresh batch of the clams even further down the beach than she normally did. She was starting to worry about depleating that resource as quickly as they had in the Forest. Needless to say, she never failed to find clams when she dug deep enough. She just worried about the day that she wouldn't. Today had been full of luck, though. She'd occupied herself cutting seaweed and laying in a pit of clams to steam. She'd waved the guys off when they had sailed across the lake in Bazzer's boat, paddling themselves with sticks for oars. She hoped they'd luck out in finding wood. The sooner they could see about the lumber for the meeting hall, the sooner it would be built and everyone would be safe.'
Once the chore of baking the clams for lunch was started there really wasn't much else to do but wait. No one could afford idle time these days so she set her bottle of water in the shade beside the lean-to and dragged out her basket of yarnballs and knitting needles. Inside, rolled up tightly, was the green and blue mottled poncho she was making for Rowan. It had started out as a sweater for Rook but once that fellow had taken off after Payne's tribe, she'd morphed it into something more practical in the here and now. Her dear friend was outgrowing her clothing and the poncho would keep her warm on cold and damp days.
So it was that she spent a few lovely hours in the early morning sun throwing stitches and building on her project. It was just about done, she decided, sure that it would reach about to the waist on Rowan, even if she got enormously pregnant. As she was folding up the project to switch to another for a while (a reddish pink bikini top for herself to make her feel a bit more comfortable) when she hear Coop holler from down the beach. Stuffing everything down into the basket, she stood up and brushed herself off. What was the girl saying? Something about dogs?
Shading her eyes with a hand it wasn't hard to spy the pack of about eight dogs or so in hot persuit. Helena's breath caught in her throat and her dark eyes widened in surprise. Nothing about the posture of those sleak, fast dogs seemed playful. Their ragged ears were folded back against their bullet heads and their feet barely touched the ground they were coming so quickly. "Holy shit," she muttered. Before she knew it, they were in the camp. Leaping over the carts, the people, even making a mess of the fire as they knocked over the stew pot. She had enough time to register the fact that Coop and Jasper were pummeling a couple of the dogs with sticks before a muddy gray and greenish black one turned his ugly bloodshot eyes on her. She could see his ribs poking hard through his patchy hide and foam dripped from it's mouth. She had enough time to hope that it was just the hard run and not rabies that made it appear that way before it bunched up all of it's muscles and sprung at her.
Her head struck the ground hard as the animal barrelled into her chest. She bit her tongue painfully and all of the breath left her in a rush. She had only a moment to see stars before those dripping jaws snapped at her face. That had the unlikely effect of making Helena angry. Hadn't they suffered enough here? Hadn't they survived the laughers and monsoons and twisters and near starvation just to have these wild animals appear and wreck the small advances they had made? It was infuriating.
She shoved hard, digging her fingers unforgivingly into it's soft belly until the dog yelped and retreated a few feet. She staggered to her feet, head pounding in protest, to try to use her height as a deterent. She'd hurt it and it knew it, now she was taller if not a whole lot heavier than he was. The dog backed up another step and seemed to spot her basket out of the corner of his eye. Lunging again, though this time for her basket of yarn, he seized it and shook his head violently. Yarnballs were flung in every direction and everything about his posture seemed to say 'see! I'm scaaaaaary!!'.
Helena boggled at the dog's change of target and yelped as she was pelted with a couple of balls of yarn. Out of the corner of her eye she saw two or three of her precious yarnballs roll into the fire and instantly puff into a ball of flames. "No!" she shouted in dismay. Their yarn was too precious a comodity to be wasted in such a manner. Even though the dog was still flinging the basket back and forth, Helena siezed her chance and hauled off to hoof the dog straight in the belly.
She kicked it do hard that it lifted up off it's feet, dropped the basket and vomited up whatever vermin it had eaten for breakfast before attacking her camp. It staggered back away from her, finally turning tail and loping off down the beach along with a few others.
Panting, teeth grit, she lifted a hand to gingerly touch the back of her head and it came away wet with blood. She thought she must have struck a rock in the sand when she fell, which would explain why the stars were spinning around her head again. And the nausea that was rushing up on her. She barely made it into the bushes behind her lean-to to empty her stomach before sitting down heavily. She was so dizzy all of a sudden she couldn't even bare to have her eyes open.