They floated downstream sometime before they no longer heard the noise of the sauropod in the trees. They had lost sight almost instantly - other than the movement of the trees, they covered her haulking mass well. Not knowing what to say, Ethan silently unclipped the oars from the side of the raft. He unfanned the blades and locked them in their splayed form, then telescoped the light metal of the handle, lengthening it to oar length. Putting it together took less concentration than he gave it. He appreciated having something to focus on at that moment. Once they were both water ready, he took them and started paddling. The boat was only just big enough for Sienna to sit in the back and him in the front and just over a metre across.
Even so, unless he was willing to slide from side to side, each oar barely touched the surface of the water. With the current moving them, he wasn't too concerned though. Again, he was just occupying himself.
"Do you even know what you're doing?" Sienna finally looked at him. She'd been in a daze since they lost sight of the sauropod. He didn't know if it was from fear, loss of their home, loss of Blue or a combination of all.
"Do you?" he snapped back. At least he had put the oars together.
"No," she sighed. "Give me one. We should practice so we know what to do in case we need it."
Ethan didn't want to think about trying to paddle away from a plesiosaur that might chase them, but practising would keep his mind busy. They found it surprisingly tricky. Even Sienna who usually picked up any physical activity quickly had them spinning in circles at times. And it was exhausting. Ethan's arms started sometime between working out how to move in a straight line but before making a sharp turn - he was pretty proud of himself for that one though, working out that one of them could paddle backwards. He was delighted when Sienna called a break. Maybe knowing that she was sportier than him always made him stubborn about giving up before her - even if he came in twenty minutes after her. This time he regretted his stubbornness though. He could barely lift his arms to eat his protein bar.
"We got really lucky you know," Sienna said, stretching her arms out. Ethan knew he should probably do the same, but they were just so heavy. He held back a scoff at her idea of lucky though. They had been chased non-stop for two days! "Nothing really bad has come after us yet, and this stretch of river was smooth enough for us to practise on. If we'd hit rapids already, who knows what would have happened.
"Rapids?" Ethan frowned. He tried to remember everything he knew about rivers. It was not a lot. "What are they?"
"It's where there are lots of rocks in the river. It makes the water really choppy." Her tone indicated that she knew a lot about them, but she offered nothing more. Their basic survival training definitely didn't include rapids. It didn't even include paddling. He shouldn't be too upset though, since they did include inflating the raft and assembling the paddles, both skills he had used.
"Do you think there will be rapids in this river?" He looked over the side, before quickly pulling back. He wasn't as scared of rocks as what else might be down there.
"Probably not." Her confidence was less certain now. "I wish we could have brought out phones with us. We could have looked it up… I know, I know." She interrupted before he had the chance to remind her. "They would be able to use them to track us."
After they ate, Sienna seemed happy sitting on the bottom of the boat watching the riverbanks pass by. Ethan was pleased. He slowly rubbed his arms, trying to massage their sore muscles. He even managed to get some stretches in.
"Hey! Look!" Sienna nodded towards a large rock on the bank of the river. There was a two metre long dimetrodon sunning himself, his sail pointing high in the sky.
"Can we get closer?" Ethan asked, then regretted it. His arms were too tired for more paddling.
Sienna's eyes dropped briefly before she responded. "I think we are safer in the middle of the river."
Ethan was relieved. Safe was an excellent reason to not have to do more work.
"Ow!" His eyes snapped back to Sienna. "Something hit me from underneath!"
Images of a mouth full of mosasaurus teeth filled his mind. He stepped on it quickly - this river was way too small for a mosasaurus!
Sienna, braver than he was, looked behind the boat. "Oh. I think it was just a rock." Ethan noticed she climbed back up so she was sitting on the side of the raft though. "Let's keep an eye out for more." She actually sounded excited by the idea of rapids.
She wasn't disappointed. Soon there was the noise of rushing water. They saw more rocks along the edge of the river - and even one more dimetrodon - and soon they could see the water rolling over the tops of rocks in the water. The were at the top of a series of foot high drops.
"We're getting faster," Sienna laughed, her paddle held high, ready to work.
"Great," Ethan murmured. Surely the boat could survive those drops. Just like that stick over there was managing. It would float right on top. He focussed on the stick ahead of them, and gripped tight to the rope that ran around the top of the boat.
Sienna paddled. Fortunately, it didn't spin them in a circle like it did earlier when only one person paddled. It barely seemed to do anything at all.
They rushed towards the first ridge. A splash of water smacked both the kids. Ethan shook his head to clear his eyes, his now damp hair spraying water. His grip on the rope tightened even further. Too soon they were heading for the next, then the next and the next. They flew from one to another, each making them bounce around on the raft, each splashing them to the point of saturation. Above it all, he could hear the sounds of Sienna's high pitched laughter. Sometimes he thought it was a scream of fear, but it always switched into loud laughs.
And then it was over. The water smoothed out back to what they were used to.
"Oh my luck! Can you believe that?!" Sienna cried. "That was amazing!" He looked up at her, watching her face split in half by the grin she couldn't remove.
Ethan looked back at the rapids behind them, and smiled too. "Yeah." He admitted. "Yeah, that was kind of fun." He gave her a grin. He wasn't hoping for too many more, but maybe one more when he wasn't so scared could be cool.
The next set came up pretty fast. It wasn't quite as smooth as the last - there was a corner in the river and they wound up stuck next against the bank until they could push off and back into the current. But it was still kind of fun.
The third set was bigger again. This time there were rocks sticking up in the middle of the river.
"That just makes them easier to see and avoid." Sienna was now a rafting professional apparently. "We're going to have to paddle this time though, okay?"
Ethan readied himself, oar in hand. He may not have thought Sienna knew exactly what she was doing, but she seemed to know more than him. He was happy to listen to her instructions.
"Go!" she yelled. He paddled as quickly as he could on his side. "Stop!" He stopped. He watched her paddle furiously. They went on, tossed and bounced as they had been earlier. Ethan wasn't convinced their paddling was doing anything, but it helped him feel like he had some control over the boat. "Gashes!"
Ethan paled. He had never heard Sienna use such language before and the rock looming towards them didn't make him feel any better. The front corner of the boat hit it causing them to spin, slipping backwards between it and another.
"It's okay, it's okay," Sienna repeated this lots of times. "We'll just turn around."
Ethan looked over his shoulder now downriver. There was a drop of a foot ahead of them, but worse than that, there were two rocks that they were headed towards and not enough space to go between them.
They took the drop before he had a chance to warn Sienna. "Paddle!" she screamed. It seemed she already knew. As soon as they hit the water, he paddled as fast as he could and he noticed the boat turning almost on the spot - except for the current that was dragging them to the rocks. "We're not going to make it!" Sienna cried just as the raft hit a wave bouncing off the rock in front of them. The raft tipped up sharply. Ethan plunged into the water below, the raft slapping down on the water above him. Bubbles of white water surrounded him. He wasn't a great swimmer and being churned made it impossible to see what direction was up. He kicked out with his legs causing him to clobber his knee against a sharp rock. The pain racked through him as he tried to move away - this time smashing his elbow against a rock. Water pounded against him, his chest strained, desperate for air. His knee hit a rock again. And again. His arms flailing as his panic increased by the second.
Something grabbed him. A new level of panic swept him as he knew it was a plesiosaur. He had to get away! He thrashed, punching, kicking, no longer aware of the scrapes. Helpless though, the creature held on dragging him away. His head broke the surface, his mouth opening in a desperate gasp for air. But he still had to get away. He trashed even hard his arms splashing water everywhere.
"Quit it, Ethan!" Sienna's voice cut through his panic. He paused. "I'm trying to help you!" The long, sinuous neck of the plesiosaur felt more like an arm. It's teeth, fingernails holding him in place. Feeling like a plush toy, he felt himself being dragged upwards. This time when his legs kicked out, it was to push himself off the rocks, upwards and into the boat. Curled up on the floor of the boat, he heaved in breath after breath of glorious air. He was not aware of the Sienna murmuring to him or stroking his hair. He wasn't aware yet of the pain of the gashes from the rocks. That would come.
They were stationary, trapped between the two rocks. It took time, but Sienna was eventually able to look at his cuts. Fortunately, his head was clear. But his elbows and knees were a mess. "What a bloody mess," Sienna said calmly as she wiped at his wound with an antiseptic wipe. Ethan's head shot up. Sienna was swearing again. "Gashes all over." His mouth dropped open, before she winked at him. "You're lucky your guts weren't gouged."
He laughed at the inappropriate language that was actually very appropriate right now. "I thought you were going to claw me to death." Sienna froze, then laughed. His attempt at funny definitely fell flat, but he needed her to laugh at it, so she did.
After a few more attempts at cursing humour, they settled into heavier conversation. It was unpleasant, but strangely felt good to explain to Sienna his fears underwater. Especially since she was terrified herself.
"What are we going to do now?" he asked, looking at the closest river bank. It was still a good twenty metres of white water from them.
"I think we should start thinking about setting up camp for the night." She sighed. "We could stay here, I guess. There's not enough room to lie down though. Or we could get to the shore. I can use the rocks to push against to unjam the boat and get it past them. Then we can make it to the shore." The shore didn't look very welcoming. "Once there, we would need to tie up the boat and then try to find somewhere suitable to camp the night. We still have about three, four hours of light left."
Sit in the boat for hours, or go hunting for shelter that might not exist. He thought about it. He didn't like either option.
"I guess, I'm a little concerned what will happen to the boat if we slept here. Could a big branch knock it free, or even the constant water?" That decided him. If he'd known that was a possibility he would have wanted to move sooner.
"Let's get to shore."
Sienna was already bracing her feet against the rocks and pushing the boat.