[b][u]Chapter 2[/b][/u] I was jerked awake by the sound of phantoms soaring overhead. My father sat not far away, watching the sky, and mother lay next to me, sleeping, but obviously not soundly. My dad turned around, his face weary and dark circles under his eyes. "Its okay. The forest canopy is too thick, they won't find us. We'll be-" however, he was cut off by loud snaps of twigs, not far off. He turned, watched the forest for a time, and then told me to go to sleep. I slowly lay down, but saw out of the corner of my eye, a strangely human shape alien, materialize out of nowhere behind my dad. I yelled, and dad jumped, only to be ran through by the strange, burning sword held in the aliens hand. My fathers mouth opened in a silent scream, and then his body went limp. My mothers eyes jerked open, and she automatically looked toward my father. She screamed, and pushed me, trying to help me escape, "Run! Ru-" Her eyes froze, cut off in midsentence. She fell, and I saw burns on her back. Instinctively I turned and ran. Loud roars accompanied me, but it only made me want to run faster. After about 10 minutes of running blindly, falling, and flailing in the pitch black darkness, I stopped, and, noticing a fallen, hollowed out log, climbed into it, hoping to evade the following aliens. Soon enough, the gargantuan elites came along, and slowly headed off another direction, sniffing the air. Once, an elite turned around and looked directly at me, but then grunted and continued on. I stayed in that log for what felt like days, smelling the putrid stink of rotting wood, and being blind to the world, as it was night and no moonlight got through the dense forest canopy. Finally, daylight came, and I gathered up the courage to exit the log. It felt like a dream, like the night before had never happened. Birds chirped, and the forest was filled with noise. But there was one problem: I was lost. Last night, I had ran through the trees like a possessed being, not caring where I went, just trying to escape the aliens. That left me with little situational awareness, and I now had no idea where I was. My parents I thought, and began to cry. After a while, I could cry no more, and decided to head just one direction, and that might get me out of this place. It didn't work. After two hours, I could of sworn I had passed the same large rock at least 3 times, and was dog tired. And, I still had absolutely no idea where I was, but also didn't know which way to go to get out. However, from my exploring, I did find a couple berry bushes, which tasted like heaven, and a stream, which I happily drank from, being as I had not had water in a day or so. I dug an indent into the ground next to the stream, near a tree, and grabbed some leaves and threw them into the hole for bedding, as I had seen a man on the tv do once. I also wondered around and found a bunch of branches, and made a teepee like structure over my hole, which I thought would help me get through the night. I slept in that hole, drank from that stream, and ate berries for the whole next two weeks. And then, like a messenger of god, I heard planes. They sounded like Pelicans! Not the birds themselves, but the troop transport the UNSC utilized! Perhaps the UNSC had come to save me! I immediately ran to the nearest tree, and climbed it, fueled by adrenaline, and made the climb in less than a minute. By then, the pelicans engines were roaring, getting closer. I saw it, and waved my wildy, like a tree in a hurricane. The pelican saw me, and let down a rescue ladder. I climbed it, so happy that I was finally escaping the forest I did not even think about the long drop down to the forest floor. Finally, I reached the pelicans troop bay, finally to safety, and upon getting there, I almost fell backwards, off the ramp, and into the trees. There were so many other people there, the bay was packed full. Looks like we weren't the only ones to think to go to the New Harmony Planet Forest. Not only was there civilians, but I also noticed soldiers on the pelican as well, wearing their combat suits, with 'D265' embroided on the shoulders. I sat down next to one, and asked him what had happened. "Arrived a week ago. Covy invasion was in full swing. Don't worry though, we got it under control. For now." He replied, barely looking at me. Soon enough we arrived at some military base, in the middle of a huge, burning city. The name of the city was Monastir. "First place they got." The soldier next to me said, seeing my face of shock. The huge base was absolutely packed with people. In the middle was a multiple space shuttles, ferrying people into orbit, where a UNSC Colonial Ship lay. New Harmony was being evacuated. The Pelican landed, and I climbed out. Immediately, the sheer amount of sound almost knocked me to the ground. It felt like I was suffocating. I was pushed, shoved, and absolutely lost, but then a man plucked me out of the crowd. "Lost?" he said, and I nodded. He placed me on his shoulders, and made his way through the crowd to a large sign that said 'shuttles'. He made sure that I made it onto one, then walked away. The shuttle wasn't very big, only about 30 meters long. Me and 40 other people were shoved inside, packed like sardines. I examined the other people on the shuttle with me, and it was not a pretty sight. Young children, just like me, sat all alone, faces weary and eyes tired. Babies cried in mothers arms, and mothers cried, their husbands not there, killed by the Covenant. In fact, I noticed very few grown men. Only one or two were on the shuttle. Most must have stayed behind, and applied for Colonial Militias. Finally, after the shuttle had been filled to the brim, and you could barely breath, I felt the engines start, and we began to go up. I looked down, as the base began to get littler and littler,and then finally, I was able to see the surface as a whole, and it was startling the amount it had changed. Huge columns of fire painted the surface. The thought of the amount dead caused by the Covenant made my stomach twist, and I turned away. Soon, we were docked on the Colonial Ship, which I learned was called [i]The Sustenance[/i]. People, dressed in their cloths rags, were everywhere. I knew there was no way I was going to be able to get a cabin, and any cabin I could get would be filthy and packed, so I found the nearest empty place I could and sat down, resting my head against the wall. In no time, my eyes were closing, and I was asleep. [Edited on 10.04.2010 2:48 PM PDT]