I was kind of disappointed that we had so many slackers joining us for the Outdoor Adventure Club's first outing of the season. And that perv of a faculty advisor was coming along too, great. But there were also some interesting new people along for the trip who were actually there out of interest. Tom was particularly amusing, but I didn't want him in my group, noooooo sirree.
Ah well, I'll make the best of it.
I read a book on penguin mating habits on the way up to Tennessee while most everyone else socialized merrily. I wish I was better at that, but I somehow had a mental block about making small talk and pretending to care about things that I didn't.
When we arrived, we unloaded the bus and got the rafts ready. Now that we were down to business, I was really becoming excited. It was going to be a fun day!
Well, when Megan called up time to choose rafts, most of everyone seemed to be waffling. Grumble. Some guy named Jim, who was here with his brother and was obviously trying to get his little brother laid, was acting very disinterested, but looked decently strong, so I grabbed him, and the other foreign student, Giuseppe, and made them part of my team.
We did okay I guess, managing the rapids. The two guys with me weren't too interested in the rafting and just plain weren't used to it at all, but hopefully my experience made up for that somewhat. One of the other groups wasn't doing so well, but nobody capsized this day anyway.
That night there were some antics with the perv faculty advisor and Megan. Poor girl. She should just tell him to fuck off. I would. But then, I guess that's why people don't like me so well. Hmphf. Meanwhile, I talked to Eileen a little bit, the sort of nerdy but cute mousey glasses girl.
The next day went pretty well, at least we all had the satisfaction of all seeing Alan fall into the water while staring at Megan's breasts. The perv. Ugh. It was pretty obvious that native american kid only very reluctantly helped him back onto the raft.
Later, when we got back to land, the native american kid ripped into Alan pretty straight forwardly about his rather unhealthy obsession with Megan. I can respect that I guess, although Megan should've been the one to do it instead. Someone else shouldn't have had to stand up for her.
Meanwhile, that actor kid cracked out the booze and engaged some locals, or rather some other party out camping for the evening, who happened to be smoking some schwag, and ended up bringing them over to our fire. I pulled Eileen, who seemed somewhat unhappy, off to the side and tried to chat her up some more tonite. She seemed somewhat receptive, although what was I trying to do really? Um, anyway…
The next day was not something one forgets easily, but… it needs to be remembered, etched into my mind, and emblazoned into the fabric of my being, because I was not scared, no, I rode a high full of anger and rage, and I refuse to accept what has happened… but, I'm getting ahead of myself here.
The rafting we did this day was pretty inconsequential compared to the day before. The rapids weren't nearly as strong as the day before, so we didn't get blessed with an incredibly amusing spill from Alan-the-perv, alas.
In the non-amusing category was the arrow that shot through the air, taking Megan out 100% in a single, fluid, act. Native american kid tipped the boat as I whipped my head around to the source of the missile. A very large thing with some kind of antlers stood on a hill above the treeline lowering something resembling a bow. Not good. The flora had obviously changed to something very WRONG. We were somehow not where we were before. Who was this guy? And there were several large wolf-like things at his feet.
IN THE WATER! I yelled at my raftmates, grabbing a handful of Jim's life vest and jumping over the edge of the raft, pulling him with me. Guiseppe apparently followed, and I noticed most of the other groups were in the water by the time I bobbed up to the surface and looked around. We made an effort to reconnect the people from all of the other groups together into a single group, and headed to shore.
The native american guy, jake apparently, took charge and barked for us create quick makeshift weapons, and to head through weird, twisted forest, and try to get out of where ever the heck we ended up. Sounded good enough to me. I was not about to end my existence here. No way.
Unfortunately we got to a clearing. Containing four of those wolfbeastguythings. There was no way we were passing through this clearing without confronting these wolfie assholes. So, the best advantage we had, was that of surprise. And after that, numbers.
And with that, we went Screaming and flailing into the clearing. It was a terrible thing, this. So many fell. It was only by luck of the draw that none of the wolfies leached onto me in particular. But with all my might and anger and refusal to give in, I bashed and stabbed and whacked at the wolfies.
Each of the two different wolfies that I wailed on took some pretty nasty hits from me, but they both ran away. Which I guess was something. But given I didn't have a particularly nasty edged weapon like Jake did, that's pretty good I guess.
Jake and his group was able to take the other two down completely. The survivors of this were Me, Jake, the actor guy, a really young kid who doesn't want to be a cop, Brianna, who was the chick that Jim's brother was lusting after, and Tom, the really dorky anime guy.
The really huge, scary guy with the big antler things came into the clearing clapping, congratulating us at our ingenuity and survival instinct. Clearly he was mocking us. But as I stood there and more wolf-men gathered, I knew there was no more fighting our way out of this. We were stuck, at the mercy of whatever this creep wanted to do with us.
You may have won this battle, huntsman, but you will NOT win the war. Not while I still draw breath.