“Do we have to run THAT far?” Aniki called, breathless, as the orphanage turned into a dot in the distance. Wind was still whistling in the twin’s ear but the rain and lightning had ceased. They’re soaked to their body, their hair stuck around their neck and the side of their face, and yet they were still running like someone is chasing them.
“We’d better, for all we know, they can use special devices to track us, we need to get out of their range.” Anita called back.
“And how far is that?” Aniki yelled, raising her voice over the wind.
“I… don’t know.” Anita admitted, slowing down. Now that they had stopped running, they became fully aware of their surroundings. The orphanage wasn’t in the city, where electricity and food was easily accessible, so when Anita and her sister had run away, they had plunged straight into the woods. The wind rustled the leaves overhead, an owl hooted somewhere nearby and a mouse scurried beneath their feet.
Suddenly, Anita heard a sneeze from a nearby bush.
“Did you hear that?” She whispered to her sister.
“Yes,” Aniki answered. And from an unspoken agreement, they both crept toward the bush and saw a boy crouching, with dirt and dust covering his body.
“Hey,” the boy said meekly, looking up at them.
“What are you doing here?” Anita demanded.
“I heard footsteps and thought it was one of my father’s guards, that’s why I dove into the bush” he confessed and stood up.
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“Let’s try a normal introduction. Hi, I’m Anita, and this is my twin sister, Aniki” Anita stated.
“I’m Feroy, and what are YOU doing here? In the middle of the forest like this?” he looked at them for a moment and continue
“And you don’t look like you’ve been here for a long time, though surely a bit wet.”
“None of your business,” Aniki said.
Feroy glared at her, put his nose in the air and said: “I am a prince.”
“And you don’t look like one right now. Come on, Anita, let’s go. Maybe we will find a small town and stay there awhile.” Aniki said, grabbing her sister’s hand and started stepping away from what she thought was a delusional boy. Suddenly, she heard a humming sound in the distance.
“Do you hear that?” Anita asked, and stopped dead in her tracks. They stood listening to the sound until they realised, horrorstruck, that it was the sound of the war planes, becoming quite deafening in their wake.
“No, no, no, no! Surely they wouldn't waste their bomb for a deserted forest like this?” Aniki said in nearly one breath.
“RUN!” screamed Feroy over the plane’s engine’s noise, and he tripped over a tree root almost at once. The first bomb exploded, setting the area of forest behind them alight.
“Oh, you idiot!” Anita shrieked, half dragging Feroy up and half running. Another bomb exploded in the distance. The three of them didn’t know where they’re heading, but they just hoped to find anything that could make a shelter in that rain of bombs as they ran. Branches of trees kept falling into the path, blocking Anita and her sister from running full speed.
“GO!” Aniki shouted, pushing them to their left as another bomb fell right at the place where they had been seconds before. Specks of dirt sprayed them, and the heat wave was so intense that Anita thought the side of her face and her arm were burning. Aniki was knocked to the ground, her nosebleed staining her shirt red. Feroy pulled both of them up and hauled them into the nearest cave.