Post by Holly on Apr 9, 2014 0:19:05 GMT -5
Have a short story that I had to do for my creative writing class c:
“Fight ‘till your last breath,” they told him several times. “Don’t let yourself be caught, boy.”
Eli scrunched his face into an undignified expression and crossed his arms loosely. In his mind, he was not the only boy there - they all were-, but the fact still remained that he was the youngest of this group and he would resign to the nickname. His face was rounder and his eyes were wider, too blue and full of curiosity to be as corrupted as the other kids of his gender. What could he say as they formed a circle around him? They were stronger, leaner, and quicker than he was. They had seen their way through bloody noses, broken bones, and purple-ringed eyes. It was a mixture of respect and fear that made Eli hold his tongue.
Shiloh, the leader of the rag-tag group of boys, graced the youngest of them all with a look of approval, though he never spoke to him directly. He was quiet, but the others listened to him when he did speak. A shock of black hair and a smile sharp as razorblades was enough to frighten anyone into submission. He was an alpha, a wolf with his pack.
A cold wind ripped through the trees, whistling past the dark branches and briar thickets that surrounded them. The glow of the moon fought its way around crowds of leaves to speckle spots of silver on the ground. If Eli closed his eyes and focused his hearing away from the chatter of boys, he could make the sound of highway noise in the distance. His mind couldn’t stay on the far-off whir of cars for long, though.
It was the light of Shiloh’s digital wrist-watch that caused Eli’s eyes to wander over to him. He assumed that the leader could feel himself being watched and held up his hand in a way to display the time. Blue light washed over the boys’ faces as they all leaned in close. Eli inhaled slowly, greeting his sense of smell with the odd combination of cologne that was stolen from fathers, pizza from the dinner before, pine trees, and anticipation -- mainly from himself. Black, blocky numbers read out the reason for alarm: 8:00 PM. It was time.
“Come on, you lazy asses,” Shiloh called over the group, gaining their attention without a hassle. He had a cocky grin. “Our enemy will not catch another tonight.”
Eli couldn’t express the same amount of confidence. That was why he was out there that night - they had lost someone the day before and they needed another for the current night’s run. As Eli steeled himself, he couldn’t even recall what the other boy’s name was. He swallowed the lump in his throat, trying to bash down the anxiety in his head with a mallet or jackhammer or anything that would suppress it. His hands wouldn’t stop shaking so he stuffed them into the pockets of his hoodie.
Everyone’s heads whipped in the direction of a whistle in the distance, man-made, but bird-like nonetheless. It only took a second before Eli was shoved to the ground as the other eight males started scattering, one pushing past him. In a matter of five seconds, Eli was left alone. Seven seconds had ticked by before Eli was pushing himself up and sprinting in the direction of the house. The enemy would be assuming him to take an indirect path, he was sure of it. He might as well take the quickest route to safety.
Adrenaline pumping through his blood and legs scissoring through the air, he felt like he was moving too fast to be controllable. Cold air gripped his wind pipe and burned it cruelly, without mercy. It clouded his mind and cluttered his thoughts. Everything that he had told himself before this whole mess flew out of his brain. Be stealthy, be quiet, cover your tracks, don’t be near another ally, be aware of an escape route, be aware of a hiding spot… None of it stuck. It felt like his ears were stuff with cotton balls as his surroundings seemed muffled, distorted to reveal no sign of an opposing threat. It was a blissful ignorance to what he should have been paying attention to that lulled him into a sense of security.
Between the loud snapping of twigs and surprised caws of blackbirds from the trees, there was something that was distinctly… not forest. Eli slid to a stop as something slithered into his subconscious and made his heart jump into his throat. No. No no no.
Another giggle resounded, more than one following after it. Harpy-like in timbre and mischievous in nature, they were closer than Eli liked. He was running once again, but this time he knew that he was being followed. In comparison to his desperate attempts to get away, the enemy was light on their feet and took great enjoyment in realizing the same thing. He risked a glance over his shoulder and found the shadows of lithe forms following close behind him.
Bad move. Eli’s leg snagged on a tree root and he was sent to the ground with the heartless pull of gravity. Rocks and mud caked his forearms as he moved them forward to catch himself. He winced in pain, not registering when or how he was surrounded again. One of them sat on a large tree root beside him. Another of the followers stood over him. The last of the three moved to block him from the escape route that he was too late to run to.
“Buck up, kid. Eli, right?” The oldest of the three looked down from her spot in front of him, smile bright and energetic. She didn’t even look winded. Wild hair fell to her shoulders, streaked with crazy dyes like pink and blue that reminded him of cotton candy when he had met her. Still did, but that didn’t diminish the failure he felt rising as the adrenaline died. He had lost to a cotton-candy-haired girl. “Shiloh should let you all know that the girls always win this game. I am the better of the camp counselors, right?”
Eli sighed in defeat and fell back to rest on the ground. His chest heaved with the aftermath of exerting so much energy, muscles screaming in pain.
“Now,” Kessia, the leader of the opposing team, drew out the word, beaming from ear to ear as the other girls closed in. From her pocket, Kessia withdrew what Eli could only assume to be lipstick and mascara, thanks to knowledge from his mother, from her pockets. Eli’s eyes widened. “What shall we do with our prisoner?”
