“Red Nightmares”
20 May 2019
Somewhere north of Saumur, Vannois, Seredinian Union
“Come on, Tolya, it’s just a little hill!”
“Pizdets, what you Vannoisians call hills are mountains where I come from, you know.”
“This just proves,” a third voice, feminine unlike the previous two, cut in, “that you need to get out more often, my eastern friend.”
The Kaselian-Seredinian man laughed, turning his gaze on the girl still grinning at him. “Do you think you could carry me, Christine? I don’t think Robert or David has the strength you have, and nobody would want to get Violette’s dress dirty,” Tolya called, huffing a breath.
Christine laughed, whacking the taller -- much taller, as Tolya stood over a foot higher than the petite Vannoisian’s 5’1” -- Seredinian’s arm as she passed him. The group, three men and two women just let out onto their summer breaks from the Royal University at Saint-Nazaire, were trudging up a hill north of Saumur, the pristine Vannoisian city that boasted thousands of acres of prime hiking land. The quintet had arrived in Saumur two days before, and set out on their hike that afternoon; they planned to reach a small lake near the Liothidian border and camp there for a few days, before returning to the village that was their ‘base camp’ and then the city.
While four were used to the rather hilly geography of northern Vannois, hailing from the sub-state of the Union and each having hiked in and around Saumur before, the fifth was a new friend made at the Royal University. A Kaselian from the plains city of Arkhipovka, Anatole -- or Tolya to his friends -- was not used to the more varied terrain, even after a year living in the West and making shorter hikes with his outdoors-y friends.
He consoled himself with the broad grin Christine shot at him as she passed by, and exchanged another well-intended snark with Robert as they crested the hill. Set out before them was a small valley, with a large grove of trees covering the downslope of the hill they’d just surmounted and a creek flowing through the center of the geographic formation. The far side of the valley, no more than a kilometer away, was almost barren of trees. A handful of shrubs were all that besmirched the vista of green grass.
Tolya almost immediately dropped his pack, pointing at the stream. “We’re taking a break, because that’s the second prettiest thing I’ve seen all day,” he cried, and with that began bounding down the valley, dodging trees as he went. Christine and Robert followed after, shedding their packs and pulling off hiking boots and socks once they reached the stream’s edge. Robert muttered something about “second best?” to Tolya when they reached him, and was rewarded with a great splash of water soaking him through.
David and Violette had, for their part, remained at the top of the hill. Removing his cap to wipe at his forehead, the former turned to the characteristically proper girl, hmm-ing. “I don’t remember seeing this on the map. At least, not on our way to the lake,” he said conversationally, knowing Violette had the map stowed away within easy reach.
“I don’t either, actually,” she murmured, shrugging off her backpack and rummaging through one of its pockets. “There was a little stream that fed into the lake, but it was coming from Saverne; Liothidian territory. This can’t be that, of course…” she trailed off, flipping open the map. The group was out of any coverage for cellphones; while they could probably manage a 999 call for a real emergency, and the nearest rural farmhouse was marked on their map as not too far off, they had been reduced to an old paper map for this excursion. “Let’s see. We started here, this morning -- right?”
David leaned over the map, shoulder to shoulder with Violette, and moved his finger a few centimeters away from the point she was indicating. “There, I think. We could see the huge boulder, just there, remember?” after an affirmative answer from Violette, he moved his finger upwards, tracking along the path they thought they were taking. “See, past those trees… and then we got into these foothills, but we never passed the old farmhouse, did we?” David brought a hand to his chin, thinking.
“Come on, you guys! It’s like thirty degrees, and this stream is a blessing!” Christine called from the water, laughing brightly as one of the other men splashed at her.
David waved a hand, not looking away from the map. “Just a minute, you guys. I think we took a wrong turn,” he called back, watching Violette trace the route again. This time, she diverged at the entrance to the foothills, veering westerly instead of easterly.
As Christine called repeated questions about a “wrong turn?” and Tolya and Robert relaxed in the water, Violette kept tracing north-west, finally coming across a small stream which fed towards the lake they were meant to be headed to.
“Oh, my God,” she muttered, paling noticeably.
David followed her progress, shaking his head. “We can’t be in Liothidia,” he said quietly, scanning the map for other possibilities. “We cannot be here, Lette, the map must be missing something.”
As the two Vannoisians stared in shock, Christine ushered their other friends out of the stream, trudging back up the hill after pulling her hiking boots back on. Seeing the pale, silent countenances of her friends up close, she grimaced. “What is it, you guys? Did we take a wrong turn somewhere? Another day to get back on track isn’t a big d-”
“We’re in Liothidia, Christine,” David said quietly, finally looking up. “Fuck, we’ve gone too far north, and too far west. Fuck,” he repeated, pulling his backpack on quickly. “Tolya! Robert! We need to go, now,” he cried, panic in his voice; Violette had shoved the map back into her pack, uncaring as to whether it was crumpled or ruined.
Tolya and Robert were slowly exiting the stream, not hearing the terrified note in their other friend’s voice. They were joking about the source of the water -- “could be straight out of some Liothidian sewer” -- when they finally registered David’s panicked yells.
The other man had run half-way down the valley, calling out all the while. “Get your God-damn shoes on, we need to get going! They probably already know we’re here, you jackasses,” he yelled, unthinking; if there was anything that was going to draw the attention of the Liothidian border patrol, it was his incoherent panic.
Robert and Tolya exchanged glances, first of confusion and then fear; without a word, they threw themselves out of the stream, pulling socks and boots over soaking wet feet. David had already turned back, jogging up the hill to where Violette and Christine had picked up the discarded packs of their compatriots. As Robert and Tolya scrambled around trees and rocks, the others threw them their packs, and the quintet began scrambling back down the hill; before them, open countryside lit by a beautiful cloudless sky rolled out, hilly and carpeted with bright green grass.
Christine had pulled out her mobile phone, and was trying to dial 999 as she ran, getting no signal; there was a line for instances like this, of course, an emergency department in the Foreign Commission to deal with these incidents, but with no reception it was no use. The five Seredinians were bounding down the hill, weighed slightly by their packs but running on pure adrenaline.
20 May 2019
Somewhere north of Saumur, Vannois, Seredinian Union
“Come on, Tolya, it’s just a little hill!”
“Pizdets, what you Vannoisians call hills are mountains where I come from, you know.”
“This just proves,” a third voice, feminine unlike the previous two, cut in, “that you need to get out more often, my eastern friend.”
The Kaselian-Seredinian man laughed, turning his gaze on the girl still grinning at him. “Do you think you could carry me, Christine? I don’t think Robert or David has the strength you have, and nobody would want to get Violette’s dress dirty,” Tolya called, huffing a breath.
Christine laughed, whacking the taller -- much taller, as Tolya stood over a foot higher than the petite Vannoisian’s 5’1” -- Seredinian’s arm as she passed him. The group, three men and two women just let out onto their summer breaks from the Royal University at Saint-Nazaire, were trudging up a hill north of Saumur, the pristine Vannoisian city that boasted thousands of acres of prime hiking land. The quintet had arrived in Saumur two days before, and set out on their hike that afternoon; they planned to reach a small lake near the Liothidian border and camp there for a few days, before returning to the village that was their ‘base camp’ and then the city.
While four were used to the rather hilly geography of northern Vannois, hailing from the sub-state of the Union and each having hiked in and around Saumur before, the fifth was a new friend made at the Royal University. A Kaselian from the plains city of Arkhipovka, Anatole -- or Tolya to his friends -- was not used to the more varied terrain, even after a year living in the West and making shorter hikes with his outdoors-y friends.
He consoled himself with the broad grin Christine shot at him as she passed by, and exchanged another well-intended snark with Robert as they crested the hill. Set out before them was a small valley, with a large grove of trees covering the downslope of the hill they’d just surmounted and a creek flowing through the center of the geographic formation. The far side of the valley, no more than a kilometer away, was almost barren of trees. A handful of shrubs were all that besmirched the vista of green grass.
Tolya almost immediately dropped his pack, pointing at the stream. “We’re taking a break, because that’s the second prettiest thing I’ve seen all day,” he cried, and with that began bounding down the valley, dodging trees as he went. Christine and Robert followed after, shedding their packs and pulling off hiking boots and socks once they reached the stream’s edge. Robert muttered something about “second best?” to Tolya when they reached him, and was rewarded with a great splash of water soaking him through.
David and Violette had, for their part, remained at the top of the hill. Removing his cap to wipe at his forehead, the former turned to the characteristically proper girl, hmm-ing. “I don’t remember seeing this on the map. At least, not on our way to the lake,” he said conversationally, knowing Violette had the map stowed away within easy reach.
“I don’t either, actually,” she murmured, shrugging off her backpack and rummaging through one of its pockets. “There was a little stream that fed into the lake, but it was coming from Saverne; Liothidian territory. This can’t be that, of course…” she trailed off, flipping open the map. The group was out of any coverage for cellphones; while they could probably manage a 999 call for a real emergency, and the nearest rural farmhouse was marked on their map as not too far off, they had been reduced to an old paper map for this excursion. “Let’s see. We started here, this morning -- right?”
David leaned over the map, shoulder to shoulder with Violette, and moved his finger a few centimeters away from the point she was indicating. “There, I think. We could see the huge boulder, just there, remember?” after an affirmative answer from Violette, he moved his finger upwards, tracking along the path they thought they were taking. “See, past those trees… and then we got into these foothills, but we never passed the old farmhouse, did we?” David brought a hand to his chin, thinking.
“Come on, you guys! It’s like thirty degrees, and this stream is a blessing!” Christine called from the water, laughing brightly as one of the other men splashed at her.
David waved a hand, not looking away from the map. “Just a minute, you guys. I think we took a wrong turn,” he called back, watching Violette trace the route again. This time, she diverged at the entrance to the foothills, veering westerly instead of easterly.
As Christine called repeated questions about a “wrong turn?” and Tolya and Robert relaxed in the water, Violette kept tracing north-west, finally coming across a small stream which fed towards the lake they were meant to be headed to.
“Oh, my God,” she muttered, paling noticeably.
David followed her progress, shaking his head. “We can’t be in Liothidia,” he said quietly, scanning the map for other possibilities. “We cannot be here, Lette, the map must be missing something.”
As the two Vannoisians stared in shock, Christine ushered their other friends out of the stream, trudging back up the hill after pulling her hiking boots back on. Seeing the pale, silent countenances of her friends up close, she grimaced. “What is it, you guys? Did we take a wrong turn somewhere? Another day to get back on track isn’t a big d-”
“We’re in Liothidia, Christine,” David said quietly, finally looking up. “Fuck, we’ve gone too far north, and too far west. Fuck,” he repeated, pulling his backpack on quickly. “Tolya! Robert! We need to go, now,” he cried, panic in his voice; Violette had shoved the map back into her pack, uncaring as to whether it was crumpled or ruined.
Tolya and Robert were slowly exiting the stream, not hearing the terrified note in their other friend’s voice. They were joking about the source of the water -- “could be straight out of some Liothidian sewer” -- when they finally registered David’s panicked yells.
The other man had run half-way down the valley, calling out all the while. “Get your God-damn shoes on, we need to get going! They probably already know we’re here, you jackasses,” he yelled, unthinking; if there was anything that was going to draw the attention of the Liothidian border patrol, it was his incoherent panic.
Robert and Tolya exchanged glances, first of confusion and then fear; without a word, they threw themselves out of the stream, pulling socks and boots over soaking wet feet. David had already turned back, jogging up the hill to where Violette and Christine had picked up the discarded packs of their compatriots. As Robert and Tolya scrambled around trees and rocks, the others threw them their packs, and the quintet began scrambling back down the hill; before them, open countryside lit by a beautiful cloudless sky rolled out, hilly and carpeted with bright green grass.
Christine had pulled out her mobile phone, and was trying to dial 999 as she ran, getting no signal; there was a line for instances like this, of course, an emergency department in the Foreign Commission to deal with these incidents, but with no reception it was no use. The five Seredinians were bounding down the hill, weighed slightly by their packs but running on pure adrenaline.