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"So…you're telling me…" Emily stared at the drawing I made on the ground. "We're about to full sprint for 10 minutes, turn around, and spring back here for another 10 minutes?"
I glanced at the sky, wondering what time it was. "There's a reason this was marketed as a full day field trip. And why we left school so early to do a tour and assessment."
"T-That isn't what I asked!" Emily yelled again. "For all I know you're just making this up to get back at me when really, you have no idea how to find our flag!!"
"First you accuse me of cheating the system to win easier. Then, you accuse me of being so lost just for the sake of screwing you over and failing the assesment? Does that even sound logical to you?"
Her face got really red. Either out of anger or embarrassment, but I in all honesty, couldn't care less. "Watch it, ash—"
"We only have 3 minutes until the flag moves. If the flag was moving 100 yards further from us, than after an hour, it would have moved over three times, making it impossible to find on a 30 minute run alone. That means that we can at least be certain that when the flag moves, it will always remain 30 minutes away. In that case it—"
"Is simply changing directions." Emily cut me off.
She seemed to be piecing things together, so I stopped talking aloud.
My theory was this. If the flag was simply changing directions, then, the flag would always be a thirty minute run away from wherever our "starting point" was, either facing north, south, east, or west.
It was actually in our favor to continuously run back to this particular starting point
And if Emily and I managed to run over 1000 yards in about 7.5 minutes… then in ten minutes, we should be able to run over 1350 yards. Give or take.
"How good is your vision?" I questioned, Emily only stared at me weirdly. "The average regular human can see over 5000 yards ahead of themselves, so, hopefully it's better than that."
"You mean…we'll be able to see the flag from that far?" Emily immediately asked. I started stretching. "What are you doing?"
"Getting ready to sprint." I looked at her without a joke in my voice. "And with all these trees in the way, our field of vision is probably half of that. But still. That's enough."
"You-" Emily started, but then, we heard a buzz accompanied by a loud jingle sound.
"All flags will be moved 100 yards in three….two….one. All flag locations have been moved.You have 20 minutes remaining before its location is changed. 19 minutes and 59 seconds remaining."
"Let's go, north!" I announced before taking off. I dodged and weaved past the trees and branches alike. Although stumbling at times, and as I got more and more exhausted, I new my plan couldn't fail me. We had already gone out in one direction. West. And even if the flag moved 100 directions away from our starting point, we should've at least seen a glimmer of it.
My only concern at this point was what the color of the flag was. As I ran, my mind was racing, just a little. There's no way it would be camouflaged or something, right? Well…there was really no telling. Hopefully it was just tall enough to—
Bzz Bzz!
"Your partner is over five minutes away. 15 point reduction in 59 seconds. 58, 57,"
I gritted my teeth and was forced to come to a hard stop while running. "Damn it Emily! Keep up!"
The countdown continued, until, finally, it stopped. Turning around, I could see the bright color of her blonde hair through the trees. Finally, she reached me, and she was panting heavily.
"W-What? What are you looking at me like that for? I tripped over a branch, okay!?"
I turned back to keep sprinting, taking off. This time, she managed to stay a bit closer to my side. I was starting to loose track of how far we ran out when finally,
Bzz! Bzz!
"10 minutes left. Flags will move locations in 10 minutes."
I came to a full stop, glancing around my surroundings for several seconds, breathless.
My heart was pounding in my chest. And despite the racing in my heart that was making it a little hard to see whether or not the flag could be here, i couldn't see anything that closely resembled one.
"Do you see a flag? Anywhere?"
"Ha…ha…w-what? The flag? N-No, no I don't I—"
"Look carefully!"
"I don't see your flag, ashtray!"
I turned around, taking off. "Then start running back to the middle!"
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Emily and I had sprinted the west, north, and west parts of the forest space. And still, it seemed like our flag was no where to be found.
Over an hour had passed as we sat at the starting point, panting.
"You…idiot…" Emily suddenly breathed. Her blond hair was wet from how much sweat was on her. Her face red and inflamed. "What happened to your genius plan, huh? Where's the flag?!?"
"Quit it." I didn't have the energy to say anything else. My lungs were aching. "We have…one more direction to go, until—"
"F*ck! Are you deaf or what!" Emily suddenly yelled. "The flag could spawn anywhere at this point! And what if it's in a tree, how will we find it then, huh?"
"It's only been an hour. Are you giving up already? Fine." I started between the trees which we had still yet to run through. South of our starting point. "You were dead weight anyways."
"You b*tch!"
I started running without waiting on a response. After a minute or two of running, my bracelet buzzed me.
"Your partner is over five minutes away."
Through gritted teeth, I ignored it, continuing to run.
"15 point reduction in 59 seconds. 58, 57,"
My feet barreled into the ground harder and harder. If the deduction only happened once, we'd be fine.
Suddenly, the countdown stopped. A coy smile appeared on my lips, but I kept running.
"Sara Bearens!! You're dead if you cost me points cause of your stupid plan!!"
I laughed a little, but I kept running. Sprinting like this for so long was making my stomach twist in pain and my legs shudder from the distance…yet for some reason,
As the wind rushed past my face and my pace got faster and faster, I started to feel reminiscent of something I could hardly remember.
Giggling. A girl. Brown hair, freckles, a water current. What was this memory that I couldn't keep track of?
Amidst my distraction, I suddenly tripped on a thick bulky tree root. The ground came whirling into my vision faster than i anticipated.
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(Hi there! I hope you all enjoyed this chapter!)