The Luna and her Quadruplet Pups by Jane Above Story

3rd Person

When dawn broke on the pups’ first full day in the Southern Isles, the sun found them still curled in the protective shelter of a huge strangler fig, safely. ensconced in the hollows of the tree it once engulfed.

Of course, the night hadn’t left them entirely unscathed. Sleep was nearly impossible in the pitch black rainforest, with deadly predators roaming the forest floor and terrifying noises echoing in the distance. They eventually drifted off out of pure exhaustion, but when they woke they were covered in itchy bug bites and sweating through their clothes.

They didn’t have any food or water, and as frightening as the jungle was, they were smart enough to know they had to try and find a way out. So the four children set out into the unknown, moving through the dense undergrowth one after the other, their small hands fisted in the shirt of the person in front of them.

Riley led the way, hesitantly scanning the ground for spiders, snakes and poisonous frogs, while the others kept their ears open for the monsters they’d heard calling in the night.

“What was that!” Ryder yelped, jumping a foot in the air when a twig snapped behind them.

All four pups whipped around, scanning the area and scenting the air. Unfortunately, their foreign surroundings were so unfamiliar they didn’t recognize any of the strange smells which met their noses. After ä moment passed without any signs of movement or further sounds, they continued onward.

“I’m starving.” Parker complained, his stomach rumbling to punctuate his words. “Are you sure we can’t eat those mushrooms we saw?”

“No, Mommy says never to eat mushrooms from the ground” Ryder reminded him, “they might be poison.”

“1 think it’s more ‘portant that we find water:”

Paisley announced, already feeling lightheaded after so many hours without hydration.

As if the sky heard her worried words, a huge clap of thunder sounded overhead and once again the pups found themselves being drenched in a relentless downpour. “Arrgh, does it always have to rain here?!”

Riley exclaimed in frustration.

a rainforest.”‘ Parker answered slyly, earning himself an unamused glare from

is a good

huge leaf shaped like an elephant’s ear, pulling the tip down towards her face

over to another leaf and

Riley followed suit, and before long all four pups were running from leaf to leaf, drinking up as much rainwater as they could. The torrential storm continued to douse the earth in fresh water, and before long the ground was drenched and inches deep in rich black

that the

Riley realized it first, jumping with both feet into a huge puddle and squealing with

cried, hopping

joined the game, jumping from puddle to puddle

before the same sprawling pool, so deep that the tops of the tangled tree roots were visible above the

quadruplets linked hands and prepared to leap. “One, two, three!” As soon as the final number was spoken,

were so busy laughing, they didn’t notice the devious smile on Riley’s face, not until she reached down and grabbed a handful of mud, and lobbed it straight at

another handful, but the boys were used to her

chortled. “ls a

took Paisley a moment to catch up to the sudden chaos, but before long she was having more fun than she could ever recall having in her young life. She’d always been too sick to do this sort of thing, and the pups she usually played with had never understood her adventurous spirit.

dove into the game with unbridled joy, even tackling Ryder and rolling around with him and wrestling amid peels of

realized it, thousands of eyes watched as they played. It was easy to feel alone in the wilderness, but creatures great and small moved stealthily around them, keenly aware of the intruders in their domain. In fact, the jungle’s many inhabitants found themselves baffled by the behavior of these strange creatures. Within minutes they were all covered head to foot in mud, racing around and splashing each other – making far more noise than any natural ground dweller would ever dare. In the sprawling canopies it was common for birds and monkeys to claim their territory with loud announcements, but things were

for, they might have noticed when the forest around them went abruptly quiet. Initially their own noisemaking had joined a symphony of wildlife calls, which had dulled beneath the rain’s deafening cascade, but crescendoed back to life as the storm eased. But now everything went eerily silent, the only sounds remaining in the dark forest were the pup’s laughter and the

the surface of the

for signs of life.