“Winter vacation! Hurray! Let’s visit the woods!” my brother, Ibrahim, suggested.

There was a forest nearby our home and visiting that place was what we had wanted to do for some time now. We decided to take the advantage of the free time in our vacation and go to the forest.

We left our house excited and swiftly walked to the forest, which was about 600 metres west of our house. As a precautionary measure, we took a stick with a knife tied at one end.

“It would be fun; exploring wildlife and testing our knowledge of different plants that we studied in biology!” I shared my feeling as we came closer to the woods.

In almost seven to eight minutes, we reached the forest. Once we were inside, it seemed like we had opened our eyes in a new world! The area was covered with tall trees, a dense canopy and small bushes were growing under the trees where some sunlight managed to reach. The first tree we observed absolutely astonished us for the tree had a three feet wide trunk! Just amazing! Such a marvel further developed our interest, taking us further into the woods.

We walked slowly, observing all the things around us. We tried to spot the species of the plants in the forest, trying to dig into the knowledge we had got in school. Similarly, we studied the different features of a plant; for example, noticing the mid-rib and veins of a leaf.

This trip was becoming more and more fascinating as we moved further, but at one spot, everything turned upside down! Our interest and enjoyment turned into fear and danger! There was some suspicious movement behind a gigantic tree.

“Be careful! Grip the stick well. There can be some dangerous animal, maybe a lion!” I whispered.

“Let me see,” Ibrahim replied while tip-toeing to have a look.

“Run! Run! Let’s go!” suddenly Ibrahim shouted in a frightened voice.

There were two armed thugs behind the tree! As we ran to save our lives, the cruel, barbarous thugs shot from their pistols. Luckily, none of the shots hit us. The sound of the gunshot set our heartbeats racing. We could hear our hearts pounding! The thugs fired more shots but due to the tall, wide trees, and bushes, the targets missed.

We ran as fast as we could. Then, fortunately, one of the thugs tripped over the woody root of a tree. While his partner helped him get up, we quickly got into a hut nearby, hoping the thugs did not see us. It was absolutely dark in the hut, with no windows. We hid behind a large curtain in the hut, continuously mumbling prayers.

We were thinking whether we would return to our home alive or not when the door of the hut smashed open. We felt like taking our last breathes. However, in the darkness, the thugs could not spot us, not even the curtains! They tried to turn on the only bulb in the hut, but to our luck, it was broken!

The determined thugs examined the hut thoroughly. As they came closer to us, their footsteps seemed like the approaching of angel of death! However, in the darkness, the thugs felt the curtain to be the wall and end of the hut. Hence, they could not find us and returned outside.

We assumed it to be no less than a miracle. When we were sure that the rogues had gone far, we carefully came out of the hut and rushed to our home. We only stopped when we reached our front door. We quickly went in and called the police to inform them of the dangerous armed men in the area.

“We are lucky to have escaped unharmed today!” I said to my brother, while we absorbed what had happened with us. This was a lesson to us not to go out without an adult with us and always tell our parents and elders where we are going. Danger can be lurking anywhere.

Published in Dawn, Young World, September 10th, 2022