An Owl's Rise

Chapter 3 3 The Dangerous Floor Of The Forest

?Falling out of the tree hollow that had been her home since becoming an owl, Evelyn's eyes went wide as she plummeted towards the ground.

Luckily, as she fell, her tiny owl body unable to resist the pull of gravity, the dense and massive leaves of the tree slowed her fall.

She landed on leaf after leaf, which slowly gave way to her weight, before sending her falling a few feet down to the next one.

This process continued for almost half an hour, until Evelyn finally saw the floor of the forest.

Bang!

Falling the last couple of feet onto the forest floor, Evelyn felt pain for the first time in her new life.

Still, she was used to pain, and since nothing was broken, she soon got ahold of herself and took a look around.

Unfortunately, everything around her looked relatively the same. There were just trees and bushes as far as the eye could see.

'Great, am I going to die again. Just when I had finally come to terms with being an owl, this happens. And I was actually really looking forward to flying.'

Her new life as an owl having taken a very unfortunate turn, Evelyn prepared herself for the worst.

'No, I do not want to die again!'

However, her will to live blazed up inside her, and her determination rose.

She was still alive, and this one set back was not going to be the end of her.

'When my new owl mother comes back, she will look for me, I am sure. She has shown that she cares about me and my dumb siblings. I just need to wait here, and she will come along.'

Yet as Evelyn waited, and more time went by, fear began to creep back into her mind.

She was starting to believe that her mother or even her father for that matter, did not care about her.

Maybe they were happy that they no longer had another mouth to feed, and it was good riddance.

Of course, this was far from the truth, but Evelyn's past life experiences had certainly not given her the greatest outlook on life.

'I wanted to save this as a last resort, but here goes nothing.'

Following her instincts, Evelyne opened her beak wide, and began emitting a high-pitched screeching sound.

This was the best sound of distress she could make, and she hoped by some miracle one of her parents would hear her and come to the rescue.

But unbeknownst to Evelyne, something else heard her cry. And while it may have been a cry for help to her parents, for any other being, it was the sound of an easy meal.

Screeching out into the forest for nearly three minutes, Evelyn's throat began to get sore, and she had to stop, the feelings of despair coming back.

Yet, her determination quickly flared up, and she decided that if no one was going to come and save her, she would have to make it on her own.

'I may have to dig up grubs or worms to eat, but I am not going to die. I just need to survive until I can fly, and then everything should turn out oaky.'

After getting herself amped up, Evelyn began digging at the ground aiming to get her food supply early.

Of course, the thought of eating worms and grubs disgusted her, but she had been eating god knows what from whatever her parents brought back. So, she was already beginning to get used to eating things that were against her original human sensibilities.

'Hah got you.'

And she luckily did not have to wait long until she dug up some sort of grub, through it looked a bit different than from the ones on earth.

For one thing it was quite a bit larger, being about a tenth the size Evelyn was currently, and having an earthy read hue instead of white.

'Come on, stop struggling.' Evelyn thought as the grub began whipping its body back and forth resisting her with all its might.

Her battle with the grub continued for a good minute as she tried to pin it down with her baby owl physique, and it constantly dove back into the ground to rebury itself.

Eventually Evelyn's fight against the grub turned in her favor, as she was able to get both of her feet on top of it and grip it tightly with her small talons.

After that she bent down to rip its head off with her beak and finish the job.

Whoosh!

As she bent her head over, she felt something fly right above her, nearly nailing her in the back of the head.

Whipping her head around one hundred eighty degrees, Evelyn just barely caught the sight of what had just tried to attack her.

Clinging to a nearby tree, was some sort of lizard that Evelyn could only best describe as chameleon esque had both of its eyes pinned directly on her, and its long tongue was still outstretched, stuck to a root not far from her.

Seeing this, Evelyn knew what had just happened and that her life was still in danger.

This chameleon like animal was easily seven times bigger than her, and definitely saw her as easy prey.

Moving into action, Evelyn began waddle jumping as fast as she could move away, hoping to somehow escape the predator that was after her.

Whoosh!

The chameleon reeled in its tongue like lighting and lashed it out again.

However, instead of aiming for Evelyne who it did not think could get away. The chameleon had targeted the grub she had dug up, not wanting to let the creature escape back into the ground.

Unfortunately, this was just the appetizer for this beast, and it had set its sights on Evelyn for the main course.

Scrambling along Evelyn franticly did her best to run away, but her small developing owl body did not allow for much haste.

Once again hearing the sound of the chameleon's tongue coming out, Evelyne jumped to the side and threw her body to the ground to avoid being ensnared.

Unfortunately, her movement had failed to get her completely out of the way, and she watched in horror as the tongue hit the edge of one of her wings.

But by some miracle, when the chameleon reeled back it tongue, it did not have a good enough grip and only ripped out a few dozen of her feathers.

Still panic was setting in, as adrenaline pumped through her body, trying to give her the boost she needed to survive.

'I am not going to die; I am not going to die.' Evelyn thought, trying to keep her fear from freezing up her body.

Soon she saw it, her hope for salvation.

One of the roots of the large tree had a small opening where it lifted up from the ground, and Evelyn moved towards it with all her might hoping to find shelter from the chameleon's attacks.

Yet as the chameleon noticed where Evelyn was headed, it hastily shot out its tongue this time not playing around and using its full speed that Evelyn had no chance of evading with her sluggish movements.

Except this had been what Evelyn had been waiting for, as she quickly turned her head all the way around.

And in her beak, she had picked up a piece of fallen bark, which she used as a shield to block the chameleon's tongue.

Swiftly she let go of the bark and moved the last few inches to the raised root and pushed herself under, as the chameleon reeled its tongue back in and angrily crushed the piece of bark in its mouth.

The chameleon then tried to fire back towards Evelyn again, but even though it retracted its tongue as fast as possible, it just missed as Evelyn buried herself under the tree root.

Once inside, for a moment Evelyn felt like she was going to find some other terrifying creature, but all was quite under the root other than a few insects which scurried away from her.

The space was actually quite small and just barely had enough room for her to properly hide in.

Crunch! Crunch! Crunch!

Not long after she had pushed herself up against the far corner of the hole, she heard the rustling of leaves outside, before a large shadow blocked out the light that was flowing into her sanctuary.

Seeing this, Evelyn held her breath and pushing herself even further against the wall of dirt, as the chameleon brought its head down and one of its eyes began looking through the hole.

Luckily there was just enough of a bend that Evelyn was able to escape the line of sight of the chameleon, and it could not find her.

However, it was not giving up easily as it began randomly firing its tongue into the hole trying to score a hit on Evelyn.

Yet a after few dozen tries it quickly gave up on this approach, and Evelyn thought the creature would go away, when she felt the root shake.

The chameleon had started bashing its head against the root, trying to loosen the dirt around it before digging out the entrance a bit more.

It repeated this process a couple of times and terror began to well up inside Evelyn as she saw the opening become wider and wider.

Feeling her instincts kicking in, Evelyn began screeching once again, calling out for help.

She felt that there was nothing else she could do other than pray that something, anything, came to save her.

But it seemed that her distress only fueled the chameleon on, as it more vigorously smashed against the root and dug with greater intensity.

Soon the chameleon had enlarged the hole enough to wriggle its head under the root, and it once again searched for Evelyn.

Quickly one of its eyes found her pushed up into a corner, and the other followed suit as it locked both eyes onto its prey.

Evelyne then could have sworn she saw a smile on the chameleon's face as it prepared to eat its hard-won meal.

Her heart began moving faster, he mind searched for some way to live.

But nothing came to her.

Closing her eyes, Evelyn felt she could only wait until she was broken between the chameleon's jaws, and hope that next time, if there would be a next time, she might be able to live a better life.

A second went by. Then another, and another, but Evelyn still did not feel the chameleon's tongue hit her followed by being dragged into its mouth.

Opening her eyes she looked out in surprise to see a large talon pieced through the chameleon's head, blood gushing out it and a lifeless expression on its face.