The wind caught her hair and eased the heat as her cheeks brightened. She put her legs out to stretch them as she no longer needed to pedal. They weren’t high in the air, but the view off the path still offered bucolic scenery and the occasional dwelling. An hour of nonstop flying had passed when Nadia reached the path that headed southeast from the forest through wild grasslands toward the coast. The path was firm, compact, and fairly level, so she geared up for a long bike flight after a short break.

For another three hours, she flew nonstop faster than any competitive motor bike racing speed while Josh braced himself on the back edge of the rim. White knuckles gripped her shoulders. They passed a vast expanse of untamed grassland, the grasses taller than people in places. After the third hour, the land varied some. A few trees, and even some slight hills, gave relief to the eye. Then they came across a shallow brook with nothing bridging the path.

Nadia finally let the tires touch the dirt. Exhausted of her powers, she dismounted the bicycle to ford the brook. Flying over water wasn’t something she could do with ease and she didn’t want to crash because her powers were draining.

Trees were scattered across the mild hills; large, leafy, green ones were clustered in shady pockets around the water. Birds sung happy sounding notes. Crickets chirped from their hiding places under the rocks. Nadia took her sneakers off to stuff her socks inside them, as she intended to cross the brook without getting her clothes wet. She folded her jeans as close to the knee as possible, and was just about to step in the water with the bike when Josh complained.

“Come on, I’m so hungry I might fall over. This is a perfect shady place to eat and catch some shut eye. Can’t we relax a little bit?”

“Fine, I guess we can stop here and rest a bit. But we have to keep it short. I want to get this trip over with and go home.”

Nadia pulled the bike back and propped it against a nearby oak. Inside her pack were two egg and olive sandwiches wrapped in plastic. Two half pint sized cartons of apple juice came from one of the supply bags. One sandwich, along with one juice, was thrown to Josh. He smelt the sandwich and gagged.

“Ohh, man! Egg Salad! Gross. Are you trying to kill me?”

Nadia didn’t pretend not to be annoyed, “There’s nothing wrong with it. Eat it.”

“I can’t. No way! It’s just too disgusting. You gotta have something else.”

“It's going stale already. If you don’t eat it now, it’ll just go bad.”

“Rather starve.”

“Don’t be a picky eater.”

“Says the guy who picked all the veggies out of his soup. Or do you prefer the girl who picked all the veggies out of her soup? I’m fine with either.”

“It doesn’t matter to me,” Nadia said with an angry hue to her face.

Reluctantly returning to the bike, she pulled a fruit cup out of her bag and traded it for his sandwich, which she unwrapped from the plastic and promptly threw the sandwich she’d made in the brook. It floated downstream a few feet, leaving a trail of dissolved egg. Once it was completely soggy, it began to sink.

Something snapped from the brook bed to tear the sandwich apart, bite by bite, before it could completely dissolve. Nadia shunned Josh as she ate her sandwich. She downed the entire thing while Josh stirred his fruit cup slowly. First, he picked a split cherry with his plastic spork, then a bite of pineapple, next a half slice of peach, and continued eating one single piece of fruit at a time. Nadia, who finished long before him, stared at him a moment while twisting her fist in the grass. She got up and walked the bike to the edge of the brook. The water moistened her feet as she waited for Josh, who watched her out of the corner of his eye. He smirked when she wasn’t looking.

“We can’t afford to waste any more time. Or do you plan to stay here?”

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“Or do you plan to stay here?” he mumbled under his breath as he got up.

There was only juice left in the cup, so he swallowed what remained and pitched the plastic before following her into the brook, where he at once took hold of an idea to wrest the bike from her.

“It’s my turn to ride.”

She pulled it back.

“It’s my bike, and you don’t even know where we’re going. You can’t even make it fly.”

He pulled it toward himself, said, “My feet hurt from being braced on that rim; besides, you can give me directions.”

“That would be far too slow!”

“Your way is far too fast!”

They viciously stared. A tug of war for the bike ensued in the middle of the brook. Nadia pulled at the rim from underneath the seat, while Josh pulled it his way by clasping the handle bar pole and the rim of the back wheel. Ground exchanged over a few feet, but neither combatant gained the upper hand until Josh let go of the back rim.

The momentum of the bike turned against Nadia and knocked her off balance in the middle of the brook, where she found herself seated. Josh lifted the bike over his shoulder victoriously with one arm and splashed her thoroughly with a kick. Water in her eyes prevented her from striking back quickly. She wiped them clear as Josh crossed without her.

“No time to waste for a swim Nadia. Or do you intend to stay here?” Josh mocked as he mounted the bike.

Nadia remained in the water holding her ankle with both hands, wincing. When she tried to stand, her foot collapsed and she found herself back in the water. Her anger and embarrassment were so great that she refused to look at Josh, who dismounted, returned to the edge of the water, and ventured to middle of the brook where Nadia sat. For the first time, he noticed how cold the water was.

“C’mon, you’re soaked. I’m sorry.”

“I can’t feel my foot. It hurts.”

“You’re lucky I have a soft spot for cute girls,” Josh lifted her ankle, “It’s not swollen. How can it hurt if you can’t feel it?”

“How would I know, I’m just a girl! A stupid weak fake girl.”

“I didn’t say that. Come on, I’ll help you up. We’ll put a splint on it or something.”

She patted his cheek with her left hand while balling a fist underneath the water with her right.

“I can’t walk. Do you think you could carry me?” She asked softly, so he braced himself and gently placed his arms beneath her.

“Sucker!”

A good stiff right hook to Josh’s jaw knocked him into the water. Afterwards, she jumped up to perform a victory dance in the midst of the brook, kicking water and laughing that she reigned supreme. Josh countered during her celebration by tackling her and sending himself over top of her.

By kneeling over her hips, he kept her seated and caught her first punch from beneath the rolling water, only to miss a painful chop to his left shoulder that sent him rolling away. With that hit taken, Josh dashed back to the other side of the brook and took cover behind a tree. It was a wise decision, for she narrowly missed him with a large stone. She lobbed stones and pebbles with the intensity of a cannon, splintering the tree that Josh used for cover.

“You just had to get me soaked, didn’t you?! You jerk! You bastard! You started this fight, now get out here and finish it!”

“Me!” He was tempted to peek around the tree trunk, but more stones flew his way and forced him to take cover, “I started this?”

“What’s the matter, afraid to lose because I happen to be a girl?!”

She reached for another pile of stones. The second her arms submerged a brown tail launched from the mud and failed to wrap her wrist. Since she was only vaguely aware of its attack, she swore she imagined it, and continued bombarding Josh’s cover until two snakes wrapped her ankles. They twirled over her soaked jeans until they reached her knees and pulled her from below. Nadia dropped the stones and struggled to pull her legs from the ground with a desperate cry.

Three more river snakes whipped from the brook to wrap around her waist. Swift chops to their wet, slimy bodies didn’t loosen their grip as they anchored her to the bed of the brook. Her chops just slid along the flesh ineffectively. As she attempted to pull herself to the shore while more attacked from below to anchor her waist.

Silently, they came from the water in greater numbers. As she struggled to move against them, the wet, slimy bodies of two snakes wrapped her wrists. They pulled her arms behind her back and anchored them into the mud so that her body arched backwards. Their methodical organization and stealthy maneuvering helped them catch their prey.

Now, they relied on power in numbers to pull her down and drown her. Nadia refused to call for help; instead, she wriggled like an insect as the snakes worked. No way, she wasn’t begging her assassin for help when she was more than strong enough to get out of this on her own, especially when she’d already deceived him once.

Josh hid behind a tree. He probably expected more stones if he even dared to break cover. It sounded like she was gathering every stone in the brook. By the time he peaked from behind the tree to ask her if she had calmed down, the snakes were arching her body backwards so tightly she couldn’t move. A fat snake wrapped her neck and pulled her head to the water line while choking her. Her legs folded over themselves as she was pulled into the water from behind. With her last breath, she finally conceded a fading choked gasp for help.

“Help! I can’t move!”

Snakes pulled her under the water.