Prompt | Hiking

Song:
Wildflowers
By: Tom Petty

The Owl House

🎃🎃🎃

Camila had thought a nice hike in the woods would be a pleasant, calm form of exercise that allowed them all to get fresh air and distract them from thoughts on the Demon Realm, the Collector, etc. Unfortunately, she didn't take into account that Hunter was a child soldier and took everything a lot more seriously than needed.

"One, two, one two- do you hear this beat? That means you walk with the claps!" Hunter barked, showing off his impressive lung capacity. He then turned to steer the youngest of the group away from a bush. "Gus stop taking pictures of plants! We don't know which ones are carnivorous yet!"

Camila raised an eyebrow. So that was why the boy had been obsessively reading her gardening book.

"Luz?" Hunter directed his furious gaze toward her. The girl was skipping along in a zig-zag pattern, blatantly ignoring all his orders. "What are you doing? Can't you walk in a straight line?"

"Bold of you to assume I can do anything straight."

There was a slap as he face-palmed.

"Hunter," Camila said gently. "This is supposed to be a relaxing day. Maybe you should take a deep breath and enjoy the morning." Hunter stared at her like she'd just suggested he ran away to join the circus. It was almost as if he'd never heard of the word "relax." Judging by the heavy eye bags maybe he hadn't.

The look on Hunter's face let Camila know he was about to continue with his yelling and completely ignore everything she said but then Flapjack snapped at him with his beak. The tweets were almost lecturing as the tiny cardinal tugged at a lock of hair. Hunter yelled and protested but he reluctantly stopped his shouting to pout at the back of the line. Willow patted him sympathetically on the shoulder as Luz took this moment to race Gus to a tree.

When the rest of them finally caught up both of the kids collapsed on the ground. Luz gasped out her victory while Amity smiled with amusement and handed her a water bottle.

"You're wasting energy," Hunter said sulkily.

"Loosen up! Hikes are fun! We can climb trees, look for odd-shaped rocks, and even find animals! You like animals!" Luz told him brightly. Hunter scowled but he did not deny that he liked animals.

"I used to go to this camp as a kid," Camila spoke up, an idea forming. "We'd do a scavenger hunt in teams to see who was the best at navigating the forest."

Gus gasped with excitement. "An activity just for studying human nature?"

Hunter frowned. "Won't we get lost?"

"It's a pretty small wooded area. I'm sure no one will get lost." Camila assured him.

"And if we do we can use our staffs. As long as we stay close to the tree tops." Willow added.

The boy did not look convinced. Luz crossed her arms and directed a devilish smirk at him. "You're just afraid I'll beat you."

"Please," Hunter scoffed. "I survived by myself with no supplies for a week. This is nothing."

"Ha! Well, I lose my phone in my room at least three times... in one morning!"

"How?"

"All I know is that I find it every time," Luz says smugly. Camila gave a poorly smothered snort. She only finds it after she tears apart her room and screams "I LOST MY PHONE" at the top of her lungs.

Hunter didn't seem to catch the lie and only narrowed his eyes. Unfortunately, Luz can be quite persuasive and Hunter seemed to have a competitive side. It wasn't hard to pull him in. Hook, line, and sinker.

"Fine!" Hunter crossed his arms and pouted. "I'll play your 'hunt for things."

"Yay!" Gus cheered. Willow gave Hunter a proud Pat on the shoulder while Gus gave Luz his notebook for her to scribble down things for them to find.

With a satisfying rip, Luz handed the pages out. Luz and Amity paired together, Willow and Gus decided to be a duo, and that just left Hunter with Camila. "Anything that you can pick up take with you. For the animals just check them off."

The groups all examined the list. Camila peered over Hunger's shoulder so she could see.

AWESOME SCAVENGER HUNT

Find:
- a cool leaf!
- a stick!
- a bird!
- an acorn!
- a pretty cloud!
- Flowers!
- rocks! (They rock!)
- a tree!
- A squirrel
- A pine cone!

She even included illustrations for all the witches so they'd be able to figure out what the unfamiliar words were.

Amity seemed excited to be doing the activity with Luz while Gus was absolutely elated to be doing a human game. Hunter, however, was very focused, and his eyes remained glued to the page. He scanned over each word again and again until Luz's loud clap pulled him out of his concentration.

"Are you ready?" Luz said with a smile.

"Wait! I have a question! Here it says 'flowers' which is plural. But how much does that mean exactly-"

"GO!" Then the group took off, all racing away in opposite directions exchanging a little trash talk and laughter as they went. Hunter stood there stunned, his violet eyes wide and confused.

"Let's start at the top," Camila suggested gently. "A leaf shouldn't be so hard."

Reluctantly Hunter followed, his eyes scanning the trees and the ground for the perfect leaf. Camila remained patient, letting him take his pick before the boy stopped to pluck one from the ground. She examined it carefully, her eyebrows raised as she looked at a red maple leaf. It was a little torn, with tiny holes where bugs had eaten it, but it was beautiful with its vibrant red colour and orange veins.

"Good choice!" She praised him. Hunter seemed to puff out his chest at that. His shoulders loosened from where they had been pulled up to his ears.

Next was a stick as Hunter insisted they go in the order written. It was also quite easy to find though they had to wrestle it away from Flapjack. Camila inquired if Flapjack would count as a bird. Hunter didn't seem to think so. He became set on discovering a human-world bird. Thankfully, Blue Jays were common in the fall as they liked the acorns. They got to witness the brilliant blue animal fighting with a squirrel over one. Hunter checked it off and took an acorn as well. Knocking out two on their list very quickly. The more they searched for things the more relaxed Hunter became and he even seemed to be enjoying it. Cloud watching was an activity that initially made him antsy but Camila listened to all the various demons and monsters he saw in the sky. Hunter gathered a rather large bouquet of daisies and dandelions. Camila took those for him so he had room in his hands for the rocks he discovered by the little stream. There was even a toad for him to watch hop around. Since they were in a wooded spot 'tree' was an easy one. The squirrel inside the tree did startle Hunter though. Finally, they gathered a pine cone. It was small and round but the blonde guy held it like it was precious. A look of awe was evident in his expression.

"Did you have fun?" Camila asked as they walked back. Hunter nodded, still holding his pine cone in his fist.

"It was... really nice." He gave her a look through the corner of his eye. "I enjoyed the morning." The words she'd told him earlier echoed on his lips.

She couldn't help but smile. "I'm glad." His cheeks went a little red at that and as soon as he saw Luz raising her items triumphantly at the meeting spot her ran to go compare, insisting that his maple leaf was far superior to her plain basswood one.

Camila shook her head, a fondness growing inside of her. It's good for kids to be kids.

NOTE****
Wasn't able to fully edit 😞

Also I left out Vi, I have no excuse, sorry Vi.

Lucky 🐞