......The barn itself was barely a shelter at all, with as many holes in the supposed roof as my mother's cullender. It was a welcome but depressing sight for our tired eyes. Our dilapodated surroundings, with its dirt floor crawling along under our feet, made me feel sick to my stomach. One look at my companion & I realised I wasn't the only one unimpressed. "Needs must" I heard my mother's voice trample its way through my brain like a stubbord elephant. An attitude of a past era, "make do & mend" sprang to mind as well, but no amount of false smiles & morale would fix this place up in a jiffy. We looked around, treading carefully so as not to crush too much of our travelling carpet, centipedes & beetles escaping from the weather where they could. We found a corner where the roof was almost intact & after sweeping as many bugs away with our feet as possible, as futile an exercise that might have been, we settled, backs to the weeping & creaking walls. Eyes heavier than the soaking clothes we sat in, we began to drift into a restless lull. The sickness in my stomach made its way slyly to my head, creaping up into my grey cells like an invisible disease. I woke sweating, not sure what it was that had roused me. Bleary eyes casualy scanning the darkness, half awake invincible covered me before my consciousness was thrust into action by an alarming noise. I woke faster than was normal, lurching my wondering mind into action. It was not a pleasant feeling. I thought I alone was awake but a hard gripping hand around my forearm told me I was not. The noise scattered itself around our barn, tickling the ground with its flickering steadiness. Were we surrounded? No we couldn't be, we had our backs to a wall. A small comfort as terror filled our souls faster than an aligator dragging its prey into that crushing & inevitable death role. Closer it came, the noise, closer. We huddled together as still as our shakes of fear allowed, pushing back in the vain hope we'd become one with the wall that had supported our sleeping selves only a few moments before. Panic filled the air, prickly & hot like a sudden heat wave. Blind fear threw us from the ground & our heels kissed goodbye to the moving carpet faster than they'd cared to say hello. We'd returned to our stormy skies, muddied path & insane eels of light, hearts pounding. The rain was not such an unwelcome guest from here, but I was not about to offer myself up to it on a silver platter with all the trimmings just yet....