Unstable Serenity - Prologue
Max's POV
I found myself lying on the forest floor, facing the sky. My vision was blurred and all I could hear was ringing in my ears, I couldn't move, I felt paralysed and quite frankly, I was scared. What just happened? Was I dreaming? Am I awake? Am I dying? I was in pain, and I felt it all over my body, I didn't know what the hell just happened, I was feeling dizzy and almost unconscious. I tried to move, but only to be met with immense amounts of pain. Was this it? Could this be the end of it all? My life, my career... Me entirely? I knew that one day I would go, but I never knew that I would go like this... Or even this early in my life. I didn't want to die, not yet, I had my whole life ahead of me! Maybe I was dreaming... It's not uncommon for me to get nightmares similar to this, but I hope that I would wake up soon.
I never woke up from this nightmare. Soon I had realized that I was not dreaming, this was for real, and it was a situation that nobody wanted to be in. After a few minutes, I was able to move around a bit, however I was still in great deals of pain. I was able to move my body in a more comfortable position, but only to be met with more pain. Pain was all I could feel throughout my body, and I hated it, it just hurt so much! After a few more moments of trying to collect my thoughts, my vision started to clear up, and my hearing came back to me again. That annoying ringing in my ears finally went away and soon enough all I could hear was nothing, it was just so quiet, I didn't even hear the wildlife of the forest, no birds or insects making noise, it was just absolute silence.
I liked the quietness, but quite frankly, it was too quiet, and from what I know, whenever it's too quiet, it's not a good thing. The situation I was in was not a good thing, and I could only guess that I was just going to get worse. I stumbled onto my feet, my combat boots crushed a pile of dead leaves as I stood up, making a crunching noise which broke the silence the had fallen over the entire forest.
I observed my surroundings, the forest was dense, and hilly. My entire 360 was covered by thick lush vegetation, I knew already that I was in more of a remote area. I looked up and saw a ripped piece of nylon caught in the trees. That had to have been a piece of my parachute that got ripped as I may have free fallen about twenty feet after hitting the trees. I then checked all of the pockets in my flight suit to see if I had anything important. Well, I had pens and papers, the only thing that I had that would be of any use was my satellite phone.
I then grabbed my phone and made an attempt to call mission control, but there was a problem with the signal, and I could not get any transmissions through. I looked around to see if there was any higher areas of elevation, it was hilly and all, but not hilly enough. No matter where I went, my satellite phone would not give nor receive a signal, my guess was that forest was too dense.
Great, now I have to worry about surviving in this thick dense forest, and it was bad enough that I was already in immense amounts of pain. Not to mention that guerillas would be all over the crash site in only a matter of hours, but I was quite a ways away from the crash site, so I was okay... Or so I think. My only means of defense was the Beretta 92FS and the two extra magazines that were strapped onto me chest, my combat knife and my fighting skills. I wasn't spec ops or army infantry, I was only a pilot, I never thought that one day I might had to use either of them. But nonetheless I had to find food, shelter or even civilization if I was going to make it out of here alive, I just hope that if I do find people, that I find the right people.
It wouldn't be long before night would come, and it would only get colder, so I had to get moving. I decided to pick a direction and go with it, so I then swiftly headed that way, hoping to find something that would help me out.
Nearly two hours have passed with me just walking through this damn forest, and I was getting tired of it, just as I stopped and rested for a second, something caught my eye. It was a road, like one of those country roads that you would drive in and be miles away from another town. I didn't know how safe I would be if I was walking alongside a road in a foreign nation that probably detested my American nationality.
I decided to take a chance and walk along the side the road, if I heard any cars come my way then I would dive into the bushes and hope that nobody would see me. The only problem was I would eventually require some help from someone that I could trust in order for me to leave this place, but I don't think anyone would trust me here.
Another hour has passed walking down the side of the road, I didn't see any cars driving down the road, it must be very quiet here. I finally reached a town, but I didn't understand what the sign said because I didn't speak Russian. Once again, I didn't know whether to hide or just take a chance, but this time, I decided to walk off the beaten path. After a few minutes of trading through the forest and trying to stay close to the town without being spotted, I finally found myself in a wheat field right beside the town. I then decided to take a chance, either I would sit here and starve to death, or guerillas would find me and take me anyways, so I mine as well just go and see who's home.
I walked up to the house of the farm, and knocked on the door. I don't think that you would have a member of the armed forces randomly come up to your front door and ask you for assistance, especially if they aren't even your nationality! It was a chance that I was going to take anyways, and if I had to, I would use my gun for defense purposes, after all that was what it was for.
A small adult vixen opened the door and seemed a little surprized to see me, which was perfectly normal in my opinion. She was an arctic fox who stood about five foot and six inches tall, she had beautiful blue eyes and was wearing a white T-shirt with blue jeans and was barefoot.
She then called for someone in a foreign language that I didn't understand, probably Russian. It looked like her husband, or other-half who also looked surprized to see me, he was a red fox who stood about five foot ten and wore a tank top with jean shorts and was also barefooted. Then a child came to the door, he too, was a fox, he only looked about nine or ten years old and wore beige khaki pants and a polo shirt. This was obviously an all-fox family.
"English?" The adult male fox spoke in a heavy Russian accent.
"Yes" I replied.
"American?" The fox spoke again.
"That too" I said.
"Lost?" He asked.
"Yeah, um..." I paused for a minute to think of what to say next.
"...Can I come inside?" I asked politely.
The fox then peered his head out the door and scanner the area behind me, as if was being watched. "Yes, come in, quickly!" The fox gestured, I then made my way into the house and he swiftly closed the door behind me.
The house that they lived in was nice, yes it was small, but the decorations really made this house a home.
He then gathered everyone to the dinner table, it seems that I've interrupted this family's dinner time, it made me feel bad.
"Here you go," The fox said as he handed me a plate filled with food and poured me a drink. "We cook more food than we can eat anyways" he stated.
I then sat in the empty chair at the small round dinner table and began eating with the family.
"How did you learn English?" I asked. I was just so curious as of to why this family was doing this for me.
The fox then proceeded to tell me his story: "I studied English while I was with the Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti, it only took me three years to master the language. I then studied in aviation, and became a pilot and flew the TU-22M for twelve years. After the union fell, I retired and moved here with my wife, Alexandra."
I was fascinated by his story, "You're ex KGB? How did you get in?"
"Well, you see I originally wanted to join the Navy and drive ships around the ocean, but with so many incidents like ships capsizing, stories of shipman dying of hypothermia and other events like the Red October, I drove my interests elsewhere, so I then took to the sky!" The fox told me.
"The Red October is just a story." I stated.
"No, it's more than just that" He said.
"How so?" I asked.
"You shouldn't get involved in things that doesn't concern you, besides, it's all history now" He said.
I was getting curious about what he meant about all that.
"Anyways, I'm sorry, I forgot to introduce you to my family, this is my wife Alexandra, my child, Boris and I am Viktor" The fox said.
"It's good to meet you all" I said.
"They only speak Russian" He stated, "I was the only one here that was in the KGB".
The statement made us both chuckle.
The pain from before suddenly kicked back in, and I let out an 'ouch' and started groaning.
"You're hurt!" Viktor said, "stay here, I have something for you."
After finishing dinner and getting relaxed on the couch, Viktor approached me with a first aid kit, and began healing me. He must have been taught first aid training as well.
After being fixed up, I took a two hour nap, the sun was starting to approach the horizon to the west, I felt so lucky for finding these nice furs, otherwise I would have still been out there.
I was then awoken by Alexandra who started speaking to me in Russian very rapidly and seemed very worried. She gestured me to come with her.
"What's going on?" I asked Viktor. "There are some furs approaching the house, we cannot let them know you're here, follow Alexandra into our wine cellar downstairs and keep quiet."
I then hurriedly followed the vixen into the cellar downstairs, and hid in a small spot behind one of the large barrels.