"Idiot, wake up...... *sigh* It's your shift!" came a soft hiss.

"Mhhmmm–" I mumbled, ever so slightly awake.

*Sigh*

I started to nuzzle back to sleep when suddenly my blankets were yanked off me. My eyes snapped open, and I was greeted with the site of stupid Reesie's face.

"I'm up," I mumble, sitting myself up on the bed.

He rolls his eyes at me, "Finally. Now go put some clothes on, it's your shift." It takes me a second to process what he's saying...shift.... clothes on...what...?

Shit!

I scramble up from the bed, "GEt Ou-" I cut myself off by slapping my hand over my mouth. Remembering that I'm not the only one sleeping in here. Idiot. I turn back towards the bed and lower my hand with a sigh of relief. Oliver is still nuzzled up soundlessly asleep. He's adorable.

I turn my attention back to Reese, lowering my voice to a whisper level, "Out. And be glad you didn't wake Oliver up." I gesture for him to exit the room.

"I'm going, geez," he whispers as he starts to leave, "Oh, and please don't forget to wake Scott up next when it's his turn. Now my bed beckons me, so night stupid." I thought I told Scott to take the first shift. Guess they switched.

As soon as he shuts the door, I grab my clothes off the floor and quickly put them on quietly so I don't wake Oliver. I then grab my crossbow from where it is standing in a corner of the room and grab a set of arrows lying on the nightstand.

I walk over to Oliver and plant a kiss on his forehead, then I fix the blanket on our bed from when I abruptly got up. Don't want him to get cold or un-comfy. I walk out of our room, then silently sneak down the stairs, careful to not wake anyone.

On my way out I grab a baseball bat with nails all on it to pack an extra punch. "Can never be too careful," I say to myself, slinging an empty backpack over my shoulder to store my bat and arrows, oh! A flashlight too of course!

With all my stuff gathered up, I notch an arrow on my crossbow and head out. I start my watch by checking the houses around on the street to the left from the front of the house before I head over across the street to the little town here for something in particular. I walk cautiously around each house, careful not to get surprise-attacked by a wandering Mara or noisy scavenger.

After seeing no clear indications of either, I head back to the way towards the house to check the other side. Once I get over to the other side and check two houses from there I notice a silhouette in the distance. I quickly looked for cover so it wouldn't spot me. Mara or scavenger could make this situation as dangerous as usual.

I crouch down behind a tree and hold my crossbow up, ready to fire. From my spot, I can figure out it is a Mara, luckily alone. I adjust the scope on my crossbow and slowly begin to stand up. I put my right foot forward, raise my crossbow high, and grip tight to the grip as I prepare my shot. Without a second more the Mara aligns just right. Deep breath in, deep breath out.

I take the shot.

The arrow flies through the air and lands dead in Mara's throat. Nailed it! The Mara falls flat on the ground.

I do a little victory dance of course.

Then I walked out from my spot to retrieve my arrow, cause the Mara looked pretty dead from my standpoint. Luckily, my eyes did not deceive me, so I bent down and yanked the arrow from the Mara. I don't want to waste a good arrow. I reloaded my crossbow back up with another arrow and put that one with the other ones in my backpack. Then I skedaddle just in case there were more than "future me" could take care of instead.

Before I backtrack to the house to stand guard, I run into the town in search of a place in particular. I went about mindfully, navigating through town for a couple of minutes when I found it, the bookshop!

I walked up to it and put my hands on the big glass window, looking in to see if I was the only one that had the idea of visiting the bookshop tonight. Everything from what I can see looks like a giant mess, I would not expect anything less, but no sort of living or dead things in sight. I decide it is safe to head in. I swap out my crossbow though in favor of my baseball bat since crossbows are not the best for close range if I'm attacked.

I decided to head inside.

I try to quietly open the door, but it loudly creaks as I do. The nerve of that door. I leave the door open and then walk in.

The little shop doesn't look too bad. Inside it's dark and dusty, a few cobwebs hanging around here and there. However, there are a couple of shelves knocked over with books lying limp about. Some of the books looked a tad bit damaged. However, if you compare this mess to some of the places I have seen during these past two years then I would call this clean.

I walk over to the nearest intact bookshelf and look for a book for Thalia, and Oliver too. Hopefully, there are good books that are still in readable condition.

Setting down my baseball bat I grab a nicer-looking book compared to the others. I lift it and blow the dust off it. I turn the book to read its spine. "Huh..." I mumble to myself, "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes,". Oliver does like mystery novels so I'm sure he'll like this.

I take my backpack off my shoulder and set the book in it nicely. I put it back on my shoulder and look more through each row of books for something that Thalia may like too. I unfortunately see nothing on the shelf that she might find interesting. So, I pick up my baseball bat and look to see if the kids section is still somewhat intact for one.

I slowly creep over the books littering the floor to the back left section where the kids books are mostly located. I make it over to the section and my prediction seems to be correct. A little sign hangs crookedly on a fallen over shelf shattered with books.

Not all of the books look in the best of conditions, but some do look readable though as far as I can tell. I crouch down, set my bat back down again next to me, and start to sift around through the books.

During my sifting I found three books in a good condition and are good books in general. I don't know which one to choose though. Shoot, what if she can't even read. "Would she like Percy Jackson, Fun Jungle, or The Princess in Black? I decide to just take all three instead and put them in my backpack.

I pick up my bat when suddenly a loud *crreakkkkk* noise, the same noise that the door made when I entered... Shit–

I quickly stand up and search for the nearest hiding spot, a couch, and silently run behind it. I hold my bat close, ready in case I have to fight. I peak over the couch. From here I can see a person rummaging through the place with a machete, a very sharp looking one at that. I'm screwed, very screwed.

Must not have been as careful as I originally thought I was being. I'm blaming the flashlight. It wasn't on, but I'm still blaming it though.

"I swear I saw somebody here!" growls the mysterious person, most likely a scavenger. I keep listening to them rummage around until I hear them make their way to the door. I let out a sigh of relief too soon because suddenly a thud noise alerts me.

I look next to me and see that one of the books just fell out. I immediately snatch it and stuff it in the backpack, zipping it up this time. As I do this it suddenly occurs to me that I never heard the door creak shut when they left.

Crap!

Words: 1,433

Note:

Sorry that this took so long to post. I hope it was at least worth the wait though. Though

 you will no longer have to wait this long again because I'm going to post one every month.

 I've actually started on chapter seven already! Hope you enjoyed and good night /day

/afternoon /dawn /dusk /or evening!! <3