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One Eye Open Wide

Chapter 3: Kill It Fast And Never Watch It Die

--THE VICTIM--
(Kellin)



I watched the shadows dance as I held the flashlight in my slightly shaking hands. Every now and then, I’d see something moving up there in the trees, but I tried to ignore it. Owls. Bats. Whatever it was, it wasn’t dangerous. The fucking forest made it seem otherwise, though. Now almost everything made me jump and turn around like a startled deer (though, honestly, being raised in the city, I’ve never seen how a deer acts like when it’s startled, so I can’t be sure if this comparison is correct, it just sounded good enough). Once I almost punched Justin, because he put his hand on my shoulder without a warning. My anxiousness was making the others nervous too – we had all become really quiet and cautious. We’d usually joke a lot and tease each other, but not now. Some serious shit was going on.

We had been wandering in the woods for hours now, and I had started to think we weren’t going to find the road anytime soon, even at all. No, Kellin, don’t think stuff like that, I ordered myself, taking a deep breath. It would just make me panic, and that was the last thing we needed right now. Panic. I still couldn’t understand how the hell this happened – could we really get lost that easily? I wasn’t sure if it was just me, or, actually, just us, or the landscape was constantly changing, and the harder we were trying to find our way, the more we got lost.

The only person, who obviously was more horrified than me, was Gabe. I stepped on a stick, breaking it with my foot, and he got so scared of the sound it made that he jumped on Justin’s back. A short struggle followed, because, well, Justin didn’t like people randomly doing that, especially in a dark, creepy forest, where we were all paranoid that something might grab us and drag us into the darkness. I completely understood him – I was pretty much feeling the same way.

No, that was it. We needed to give up. If we walked any farther, we risked getting deeper inside the woods, and that was a terrible idea.

After discussing all the options, we decided to stop for awhile. Since I was the only one with a watch, and mine had stopped, we couldn’t be sure what time it was, but I had the feeling it was past midnight. However, it seemed that the time in this forest passed differently, so I couldn’t be one hundred percent sure…

Jack proposed to wait here until the morning, and one of us would stay up to watch for animals and other potential threats. Jesse, being (or at least pretending to be) the fearless bastard he was, decided to take the first few hours of watch, next was Justin, than me, and then the others. Honestly, I was a bit too nervous to sleep, but I knew I had to. This whole situation alarmed me and once I closed my eyes, all the episodes of Supernatural and Walking Dead I had watched rushed into my mind, sneaked into my dreams and filled me with worry and silent fear. Something was totally off, and I knew it, but I was afraid to say it out loud, because the others would probably laugh at me. Oh well. Or maybe I was just paranoid.

Two hours later I had finally sunk into restless, dreamless sleep. Mysterious (or at least they seemed mysterious to me) noises startled me all the time and I just couldn’t relax properly. The ground was uncomfortable and even though we chose the best spot we could find, sharp sticks and random rocks lightly scratched my skin, making me flinch and shift around. And, of course, there were the mosquitoes. No, those weren’t mosquitoes. Those were fucking monsters, seriously, they flew around my head, buzzed into my ears, tickled my nose and bit my skin, causing me to scratch all the time. When I finally managed to ignore all those things and fall asleep properly…

Eh. I woke up at my friends’ voices and footsteps, the slight panicked chaos slowly spreading in the air. I furrowed eyebrows, unamused, rubbed my face and sat up, trying to understand what was going on. Next to me, Jack was still sleeping, but the others were up, and they looked alarmed.

“Guys…?”, my voice sounded quiet and raspy, so I coughed and tried again, louder. “Guys, what’s going on?”

I looked around and my eyes met Justin’s, who was now looking for something in one of our bags. When he realized I’m awake, he tried to smile reassuringly, but he looked absolutely terrified.

“It’s Gabe, he thinks he saw someone sneak close to us and he thought who-or-whatever-the-hell-this-thing-was, is here to kill us. Which is bullshit, of course, it was probably just a dream, or a shadow. So go back to sleep.”

“I’m telling you, dude!”, Gabe insisted. In the darkness I could distinguish him standing near a tree a few feet away from me. He was wearing dark clothes, so he was barely visible, but his face was so pale that I could probably see it from the other side of the forest. “There was this… this thing! It looked like a shadow, but it moved, and I swear it was going to do something really, like, really bad to us!”

“Look who’s watched too many horror movies.”, Jesse snorted out. He was up too, but still calmly sitting, as if what was going on didn’t concern him at all. It wasn’t easy to find something that would seriously scare him, and even though Gabe’s panic seemed contagious to me, Jesse didn’t seem to care. He was, like, immune to that kind of stuff. “There’s nothing here, Kell. I was up the whole time, if there was something, I would see it. Gabe’s just imagining things.”

“I’m not!”, our drummer insisted, but Jesse ignored him.

“Well.”, Justin finally found the thing he was looking for and pulled out the flashlight.”, I don’t know if you were or not, but I’m going to check.”

“What? No, no, dude, don’t do that, please, I don’t think it’s safe…”, Gabe had started to stutter, he grabbed Justin by the edge of his shirt to keep him from going to investigate. “It could be a bear or something, you shouldn’t-”

“And you’re coming with me.”, Justin interrupted him. “You too, Jesse.”

Jesse let out a deep sigh, but got up. Gabe didn’t look so willing to go, though.

“But… I don’t think it’s a good idea... I know what I saw, Justin. I know it was something dangerous. So it’s a horrible idea to go look for it…”

“Kellin,” Justin interrupted him, turning to me. “You stay here with Jack. We’ll be right back. I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about.”

“Right…”, I nodded hesitantly. I wanted to follow them, but I couldn’t leave the sleeping Jack alone. Of course, Gabe could stay with him, but considering how scared he was, maybe it would be a bad decision. “Okay. But leave me a flashlight, too, if you have a second one, I don’t wanna sit here alone in the darkness, y’know.”

“Use your phone, genius.”, Jesse rolled eyes. “It won’t take us long, we’ll be back soon.”

After these words, he turned around and walked away, taking… no, dragging Gabe along with him. Justin just shrugged helplessly at me.

“Sorry, bro. I know that’s dumb and Gabe’s probably just seeing things, but well, we gotta check. It’s a bit creepy, y’know. This fucking forest and all…”

I sighed in relief, glad to know someone else thinks so too.

“I know, right, it scares the crap outta me.”, I frowned. “It’s, like, the magical forests from the horror stories, haunted by ghosts and all. I don’t like it here.”

“Yeah, I know, but it’s still just a forest. It might seem mysterious, but it’s no different from all the other woods. Besides, we’ll be outta here in the morning.”, he smiled a bit, to show me that I shouldn’t worry. “It’s all gonna be alright, Kell.”

“Justin! Get your ass here!”, Jesse’s voice sounded from somewhere near.

He rolled eyes.

“Coming!”, he turned to me again. “Be right back.”

And he vanished after my two other friends.

Dammit. I had a bad feeling about this…

I turned on my phone and started messing with the options, looking for a way to keep it lit up. Jack was still sleeping. Hell, how did this guy manage to ignore all the noises and panic around him and keep quietly snoring? I was tempted to wake him up, but I decided not to. Yeah, if I did I’d feel less scared, less lonely and definitely calmer, but I felt like I simply can’t drag him out of his sweet dream world to this real life nightmare. I concentrated on my phone’s screen, to keep myself distracted from the noises around me. My battery was a bit low. Damn. Soon it would be gone and I would have to stay alone in the darkness.

Alone in the darkness…

Nope, nope, I didn’t like that.

The ghostly light was slipping across my fingers as I absent-mindedly started playing some stupid game, just to do something to pass the time, instead of thinking about why the guys are taking so long to come back and what might have happened to them. I glanced at the digital watch in the right corner of my screen just to see it had stopped too, at the exact same time as the one on my wrist. Hah. That was weird, and it slightly alarmed me. I was okay with scary stuff. Vampires? Fine. Ghosts? They weren’t even that creepy. What scared me in that moment was the unknown. I had no idea what was going on, but I knew that things weren’t going well at all. First the van. Then Jesse and his stupid decision to vanish in the forest without telling us where he was going. Then, of course, we were lost. And now this. It was a strange series of coincidences, which probable weren’t all coincidences, after all…

After about ten, or maybe twenty minutes, the silence was broken by my friends’ voices once more, but this time it was much more worrying. At first I couldn’t understand what they were yelling, whatever it was, I could tell by their tone that something bad had happened. Without thinking, I quickly slipped the phone into my pocket, got up and rushed towards the noise, completely forgetting that I must stay and watch over Jack. When I had passed half of the way, I realized two things: one, I was almost certainly exposing Jack to risk by leaving him all alone in the middle of nowhere; and two, I didn’t have a weapon, which was, to say the least, dangerous. I stopped, hesitating, but then the voices sounded again, this time louder, perhaps because I had gotten closer. And the closer I got, the more I heard, and the more I heard, the more frightened I became, now, when I could understand what they were saying… no, not just saying. Yelling.

“Where’s Gabe?”

“Gabe!”

“Turn on the fucking flashlight, Justin!”

“I can’t!”

“Shit, what-”

“Turn it on!”

“I can’t, I CAN’T, GODDAMIT! It’s broken or something!”

“Justin, what the hell?!”

“It just doesn’t work, or, I don’t know…”

“Gabe, where have you gone, you son of a bitch?”

“GABE!”

“Jesse, get back here!”


My hesitation had disappeared, replaced by the urge to go help my friends, whatever was going on. My mind was a complete chaos, all the hairs on my arms had straightened up in the sudden horror that maybe Gabe’s feeling turned out to be right… I opened my mouth to yell something, but then I closed it, realizing that shouting out loud might attract the unknown attacker’s attention. So instead of rushing into a possible trap, I quickly followed the sounds, trying to stay as quiet as possible. I spotted a figure somewhere ahead of me, and as soon as I got closer, I could tell it was Justin. But before I could call out to ask what the hell was happening, someone suddenly grabbed me from the back, gagging my mouth, pushed me aside, and then pinned me against a tree. I gasped, trying to scream for help, but as I said, my mouth was gagged, I couldn’t make a sound.

The grip loosened around me as unexpectedly as it appeared and I used the moment to cry out:

“Justin! Justin, I’m here, there’s someone-”

“Shh.”, the unknown man, invisible in the thick darkness, gagged my mouth once more, stopping me from calling my friends. “Shut up, you stupid boy, or I’ll have to punch your lights out.”

His voice was soft, almost a whisper, and somehow it reminded me of melted chocolate and pancakes on Sunday morning, no matter how stupid this sounded. It was almost pleasant and if I wasn’t scared to death at the moment, I would consider this timbre as extremely attractive… Or maybe it was just the adrenaline speaking. Even though he was shorter than me, he was stronger, his hands were roughly pressing me against the tree, not allowing me to struggle. I tried to kick him in the balls and get away, and I almost succeeded, but the guy was expecting this, so he just flinched a bit, without letting me go.

“Goddamit, kid, we’re losing time, and you really need to calm the fuck down.”, he murmured. “I’ll leave you here if you promise not to do something stupid, or I’ll have to hit you in the sweet, pretty face.” He chuckled softly, but unhappily, his laughter sounded more like a habit than like a normal instinct. I shuddered a bit as he leaned closer. “Don’t. Move.”

…And he disappeared as fast as he had shown up. My heart was racing, I was so confused and panicked that I felt like I was suffocating, but I tried to stay as calm as possible and look for a reasonable explanation for all this. I took a few moments to catch my breath after the shock, and then did exactly what the mysterious man had told me not to – I ran.

Perhaps it would be a better idea to go in the opposite direction, back to Jack, but being the stupid, wannabe courageous motherfucker I was, I rushed towards the place I had last seen Justin. This time I was more careful, looking around for more potential attackers. No one showed up, though. No one jumped out of nowhere, no one “punched my lights out”. What worried me more was that I didn’t see my friends anywhere too.

Shit, shit, shit… My mind was a complete chaos. What… Who… Where…

Suddenly, after what seemed to me like at least ten minutes, but was probably just a few seconds, I made it to a small clearing. At this moment many things happened.

“Guys!”

…First, I found my bandmates. Well. Most of them, but back then I didn’t notice someone’s missing. Justin was screaming something at the others, but I was so confused that I could barely understand him. Jesse, on the other hand, had gone completely quiet.

Second, in the middle of the clearing something was burning. I narrowed eyes, trying to tell what it was, but it looked like… a deformed human figure.

And third. Gabe was missing.

Gabe was missing.

I stared at the burning thing. Could this be… No…

“…Kellin! KELLIN!”

I realized someone’s shaking me by the shoulders, and blinked, trying to focus on him. It was Justin.

“Justin… What… Who is…?”, I coughed, trying to form a normal sentence. “Where’s Gabe? Is it-”

“Couldn’t find him.”, he explained sharply.

“You… And what is…”, my eyes moved to the burning figure. “What is that…?”

“I’m not sure. Something bad. Doesn’t matter now.”, my friend cut me off.

…Okay. So the burning figure wasn’t Gabe, thank God. Gosh, sometimes the pictures my brain draws when I’m scared are horrible. I took a relieved breath, but I paused in the middle, remembering about the stranger in the woods. Before I could tell this to the others, though, I caught the glimpse of something moving near the burning body, but still away from its light. For a second I thought that Gabe had come back, but then a spark illuminated the man’s face and he was most definitely not him. He had long, curly and really messy brown hair and big, deep eyes. A smile would make the sharp, somehow severe, but delicate features on his face soften a bit, but right now his thick eyebrows were furrowed in tension and concentration. One thing I knew for sure. I had never seen this guy before. Then what was he doing here, with Jesse and Justin, and where had he come from?

I opened my mouth to ask him that, but in that moment he spoke up.

“Colonel. It’s a Colonel. And it does matter, I could say your lives depend on this.”

My face went pale and I remained with my mouth open. I knew who that was. I recognized the voice.

“You… You dick!”, the words slipped out of my mouth before I could stop them. I turned to Jesse. “I don’t know who this guy is, but he just attacked me, a few minutes ago, he threatened me, and-”

My attacker rolled eyes, interrupting me:

“Oh, don’t start complaining now, I fucking saved your life. You should be grateful, darling, you could be lying back there under that three unconscious, or, worse – you could be here, and dead. So yeah, I guess I don’t deserve to be called a dick, especially now, especially by you.

“What is that supposed to mean?”, I unconsciously took a step back, raising an eyebrow skeptically. “Saved my life? How so?”

“Yeah.”, Jesse finally spoke up. “Explain. What the fuck just happened?”

The man let out a deep sigh.

“I’ll do the explaining later. A few things you need to know, though. One, stay out of the shadows. Two, flashlights are useless, they eventually would stop working. Three, watches are useless too, because here time is quite… changeable. Four, keep something that you can make fire with, like, lighters, matches, stuff like that. You’re gonna need it. And five, try your best not to sleep much, because you might never wake up, if ya know what I mean.”, the guy smirked slightly. “My name is Vic, follow me and do exactly what I tell you to, and I’ll get your asses out of here. Comprendes?”

“I’m not sure…”, Justin said slowly, cautiously.

“A few things I need to know first.”, I stepped in again, copying the stranger’s words and attitude, in a sudden fit of courage. The fear that filled me was slowly being replaced with anger. Who was this guy, anyway? Who was that Colonel, or whatever, and why the hell did they burn him… or it? Was it a threat? Was it even human? Why was Vic helping us? And was he, actually? I had so many questions, I didn’t understand so many things, but I couldn’t decide which one to ask first. However, somehow I managed to keep my voice steady as I looked into his eyes. “First, what are you doing here, in the forest, yourself? I doubt you’re a tourist. Also, I just met you, but you seem to know a little too much about the things that are happening around, which I consider as quite… alarming. How can I be sure you’re not hostile? Why should we trust you?”

The man, who had introduced himself as Vic raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, trying to play brave, hm? Look, kid, if I wanted you to get hurt, I’d simply let the Colonel kill you, and it was going to do it, take my word. For now there’s no time for more questions, we gotta go before more of the bastards come…”

“You mean more Colonels?”, Jesse asked suspiciously.

“No, I mean teddy bears. Of course I mean Colonels, stupid.”

“How about Gabe and Jack?”, Justin spoke up again, maybe a little louder than he should’ve. I could sense the nervousness in his voice. “We came here with two more friends. We can’t leave without them, y’know.”

Vic rolled eyes.

“I don’t think you understood me correctly. We. Need. To. Leave. Now. If your friends aren’t dead already, they will be soon.”

What the fuck was this guy talking about? Dead? No. Bullshit. Was he threatening us? I felt the sudden urge to punch him. I mean, who the hell did he think he was? He simply came here, pushed me to a tree, and then started walking around and telling us what to do. He claimed to just have saved our lives, but not knowing any details, I couldn’t be sure his words were true. Yeah, yeah, I know. Maybe I have trust issues. So what? It’s good to be cautious. Especially in such a strange situation.

Before I could do anything, though, I heard footsteps and quiet curses somewhere behind me. Vic’s eyes moved right to the direction of the noises and his hand slipped into his pocket. I didn’t know what he kept there, but I assumed it must be some kind of a weapon. In the next moment I recognized the murmuring voice and realized that Vic might accidentally kill Jack, thinking he’s an enemy.

“Wait!”, I stopped him, grabbing his wrist and keeping him from doing anything. He cast me a questioning look.

I didn’t need to explain, because in this moment Jack found himself on the clearing. Seeing the confusion on his face pretty much let me know how I must’ve looked like, when I was at his place. His look moved from us to the corpse. The fire was already dying out, leaving just ashes. That was weird… I knew that human bodies didn’t burn this way…

“What the fuck is that?”, Jack finally managed to say, then moved his look back to us and noticed Vic. “Who the fuck are you? What the fuck is going on?”

I couldn’t help but chuckle at how his tone escalated with each sentence.

Realizing what horrible mistake he almost made, Vic bit his lower lip and left whatever he was going to pull out of his pocket, inside. Instead of setting him on fire or something, he held out his hand to Jack.

“Vic. I’m here to get you out.”

My friend suspiciously looked at his hand.

“Are you from the police?”, he asked cautiously.

Vic hesitated.

“…No.”, he finally said, but that was all. No further explanations. The answer seemed to satisfy Jack, though.

“Good. I don’t trust cops.”, he shrugged. “I’m Jack. And who’s that dude over there?” He nodded at the remains of what Vic had called a…

“…Colonel.”, he quickly announced and then turned to the rest of us. “So? Now, when we’re all here, shall we go or what?”

“How about Gabe?”, Jesse insisted. Now, when he was out of the shock, he had started to return to his usual condition this day – anger.

“Wait, wait, wait.”, Jack’s look moved from Vic to Jesse. “Gabe’s not here? Where did he go, where is he?”

“Dead. Most certainly.”, Vic shrugged, like someone’s death was something usual and not worth his attention. “Now let’s leave, please? We’re losing time.”

Oh dear, this guy was slowly pissing me off, I hated him more and more with every next second.

“No.”, I heard myself saying. “No, I’m not leaving without my friend, I’m coming back to find him.”

“Bullshit, you’re not going anywhere, let’s go.”, Vic rolled his eyes once more. “C’mon.”

“I said I’m not coming with you!”, I raised my voice. “How do you know Gabe’s dead? Did you see him?”, then I added accusingly: “Or you maybe killed him?

“Watch your mouth, kid.”, he warned me, clenching his fists. “You don’t know me. I know I’m rushing you to do things you don’t understand, and I might look rude, cold-blooded and shit, but I ain’t a killer. So don’t, don’t you say for one second that I am. You hear me? You hear me?

“How about this… Colonel? You killed the thing.”, I pointed out.

“…That’s different.”

I ignored him.

“I’m going back for Gabe.”, I announced quickly, intent not to let him object this time.

“No, you’re not! Do you have any idea how risky this is? Do you, hm? Dammit, kid, because of your stupidity we’re all gonna get killed.”

“I’m going back.”, I repeated.

“No, you’re not.”

For a moment we just stood there, looking at each other, and I felt how both our bodies tensed. I knew he wanted to hit me, I could tell by his position and the way he held his arms, but hell, I wanted to hit him too, so badly… For one long, stressful minute, we watched each other in the eyes, not daring to move or make a sound, because everything could provoke a possible fight. This gave me the chance to take a good look at him, to observe him well. Even though he seemed skinny to me at first, now, in the light of the dying fire, I could see that he actually had a quite good body construction – even though he was short, he was fit, he looked like a person, who doesn’t eat much, but spends a lot of time working on his physique. I supposed he had spent some time in the forest already. There were leafs tangled in his long hair, scratches on his arms and hands, from when he had crossed the bushes. All this was giving him that, sort of… “wild” look. Attractive was the word that rang through my head again. He really was, even though I didn’t like this. That didn’t change the fact that I just couldn’t stand him, though.

It took us one more minute to calm down, and Vic finally turned his back on me, looking to Justin, who had just spoken up.

“Okay, let’s not jump to a conclusion. Slow down with all those accusations, Kellin.”, he sighed, trying to be the reasonable one here. Then he moved his look to Vic. “And alright, we’ll follow you, but know that we’re four, and you’re only one. If we sense you’re up to something, we can easily kick your ass, you know. And after you do all the explaining, we might come back and look for Gabe. If you’re right, though, if he’s really dead, you owe us a little more than just explanation.”

Perhaps I should have felt relieved that someone had finally come up with something that made enough sense, but I didn’t. I just felt betrayed, scared and confused once more. That was it. I had to give up, since my idea was much worse than Justin’s. We could always try to find Gabe in the morning, it would be much easier and less dangerous. Though, if Vic’s suppositions were correct, tomorrow morning would be too late. Anyway, there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t go back alone. I didn’t have a flashlight, I didn’t have a lighter, I didn’t have a weapon, all I had was the well-known to me fear.

Jack put his hand on my shoulder and patted it lightly.

“I’ll help you find him later, Kell. I’m sure he’s fine, though.”, he smiled optimistically. “Maybe he’s just lost. Right, Weird-guy-whose-name-I-couldn’t-remember-and-who’s-not-a-cop?”

Vic chuckled and this was the first real laughter I heard from him.

“Right.”, he said, a bit doubtfully. “Maybe. Come on, now.”

He turned around and started walking towards the trees, automatically assuming we’re following him.

I hesitated, then called out after him:

“Oh, and hey, Vic?”

He stopped and looked back at me. “What?”

“You might be, as it seems, more experienced than us, but that better not make you think you’re the boss here. I know that having more information than the others gives you some power, but know that I’m only doing what you tell me to, because I find it necessary for our escape.”

Vic stared at me, but I couldn’t quite read his expression. After a moment, he let out a deep sigh.

“Alright, whatever you say, darling. Now move your ass already and come. Try not to stay too far behind, don’t do stupid things, and everything would be fine.”

After saying this, he disappeared in the thick web of leafs, branches and roots, followed by the rest of my band. Realizing I was a little left behind, I hurried after them.

A mistake. I was totally making a mistake.

* * *

--THE SAVIOUR—
(Vic)



Stupid, stupid boys. Stupid boys, with stupid ideas.

So, so, stupid, but yet, so, so innocent…

Half an hour earlier, I was cautiously walking through the trees, carefully avoiding dry sticks, leafs and anything that would make a sound. My arm was itching like a bitch, but I didn’t dare to scratch it, because it would make it bleed, and the last thing I wanted was to let the motherfucking creatures smell it. I didn’t want a goddamn Colonel on my track, especially since I had been following one for almost two hours now.

I almost tripped in a root as I tried not to move my look from the creature. If I looked away, I’d be damned if I could find it again. They were really hard to see with their shadow-like figures and smooth movements. Sometimes, if you weren’t careful, you could almost think they’re just shadows, cast by the flashlight, or the lighter, or whatever. For the few days I had spent here, I had learnt how to recognize them, though. I knew their tricks. Bad thing was, they also knew mine, and had remembered to stay away from me.

With my eyes still fixed on the “shadow”, I found myself at a small stream… if I could call it a stream at all, so tiny that it was more like a puddle. It was hard to find water here, and if you did, it was rarely clean. Anyway, I took advantage on my accidental discovery and quickly filled my bottle, then I jumped over the “puddle” and kept tracing the motherfucker.

I wondered if the others were already worried. I hadn’t told them I went hunting, and still, they probably figured it out. I often did that – disappearing without telling them, and I supposed they were used to it. I hoped so. I remembered my brother’s concerned expression and suddenly regretted for being such a dick all the time. It wasn’t their fault I was in a bad mood ever since we came here, so they didn’t deserve my constant bitching. However, I blamed my temper on my shitty life – lonely, always hurt for different reasons (mostly because of my job), misunderstood orphan, twenty-seven but still single, without a family and almost no friends. I was beginning to become pretty fed up with myself. The thought that probably the only thing I was good at was killing, was depressing.

Distracted by my thoughts, suddenly I realized I don’t see the Colonel anywhere around. Shit! Shit! Shit! I had lost it!

“Where are you, you little shadowy bitch…”, I murmured, my hand looking for the lighter inside my pocket. I had to be always prepared for surprising attacks…

Suddenly I heard a voice and almost jumped.

Oh dear. Not them again. Not the guys with the van.

“…Justin, what the hell?!”

“It just doesn’t work, or, I don’t know…”

“Gabe, where have you gone, you son of a bitch?”

“GABE!”

“Jesse, get back here!”


I bit my lower lip, mentally cursing at them for being so dumb and yelling so loudly. Dammit, didn’t they have any instinct of self-preservation?! They weren’t only exposing themselves to risk, but they were also ruining my hunt.

Goddammit.

I let out a deep sigh and quickly headed to the place I heard the voices from. I couldn’t quite place them, but they were somewhere near… I just saw the first figure, when I tripped into something.

“Shit!”, I gasped and gabbed a branch to keep myself from falling, bruising my arm a little. It hurt, but I ignored it, concentrated on the thing that had tripped me.

Two lifeless eyes stared up at me, but I knew they couldn’t see me, they couldn’t see anything anymore. I narrowed my eyes at the dead body in my feet and after a moment I recognized one of the boys, the especially loud and panicked one. Damn. It seemed the Colonel I had been following wasn’t after me or my friends at all. It was after those guys, and I knew that just one victim wouldn’t appease him.

“I’m sorry, dude.”, I whispered to the corpse, knelt down and closed his eyes. “I know you deserved better.”

That was enough for a “Goodbye” speech. I left him where I had found him and quickened my step. His face would join all the others in my nightmares, all the others I couldn’t save… For now I pushed this thought aside. I had work to do.

A movement between the trees made me stop again. It took me a few seconds to make sure it wasn’t another Colonel, and after that it was all easy. I knew what I had to do. I had to stop whoever this was from running straight into the trap.

Umm… I hesitated. No, I wasn’t going to throw him unconscious, that would be a bit rude. Threatening him would do.

I sneaked behind him and grabbed him from the back, pressing my hand to his mouth. I felt his heart start beating frantically in his chest as he realized he was being attacked. I tossed him to the nearest tree, still keeping his mouth shut, to make sure he won’t start screaming, and pinned him against it. His big blue eyes widened and he started struggling, breathing heavily and trying to break free. I felt bad for the guy, he was so scared and confused, so helpless. For a moment I didn’t do anything, staring into his eyes, thinking over my next step. I decided to let him go, but the moment I loosened my grip, he started screaming like a motherfucker, so I had to quickly gag his mouth again.

“Shh.”, I whispered. “Shut up, you stupid boy, or I’ll have to punch your lights out.”

That seemed to tame him for a second, but then he suddenly tried a nasty kick on me. I was expecting him to try to do something like that, though, so I moved back a bit, avoiding the hit.

“Goddamit, kid, we’re losing time, and you really need to calm the fuck down.
I’ll leave you here if you promise not to do something stupid, or I’ll have to hit you in the sweet, pretty face.”, I shook head, chuckling unhappily. I knew I was just scaring him more, but what could I do? That was the only way I could think of to keep him from running away. I leant in, feeling him shudder in my arms. “Don’t. Move.”

Then I let him go. I didn’t have time for him, I rushed to help the other boys. If they weren’t dead already.

Soon I got to a small clearing between the tall trees, just to find my sweet Colonel leant over one of the guys. Damn, I was late, wasn’t I…

From a shorter distance, the Colonels looked pretty differently. Now, when I was only a few feet away from it, it looked more like a faceless man, dressed in a dark military uniform, soaked with blood. I couldn’t really tell which war his clothes were from, but they looked old.

“Hey, motherfucker!”, I yelled. I had started to panic, but I managed to keep my voice steady and unimpressed, trying to play badass.

The Colonel looked up at me, his grip around the guy’s throat loosening a bit. My eyes stopped at the empty place, where his eyeholes had to be, and I shuddered. His features were smeared, barely visible on the pale mess that was supposed to be its face.

The kid used this opportunity to push the creature away from him and get away, trembling with fear. Still staring at the Colonel’s face, I smirked and clicked my lighter on. The monster made a half-gasp, half-scream, almost soundlessly, and flinched away from the light. Oh yes, its pain. It just tasted so good. My grin widened.

“…Gotcha.”

And I threw the lighter at it. I didn’t worry about losing it – I had another one, safely hidden in my other pocket.

The Colonel jumped back, quickly catching fire, and crumbled down to the ground. It maybe looked human, but it burned like motherfucking wood.

“WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?”, the guy I had just saved screamed at me, trembling hard, still too scared to cry, or ask reasonable questions. I didn’t reply.

I looked away from the burning corpse, which was quickly turning into ash. Kill it fast and never watch it die. A simple, seemingly pointless rule I kept. Never watch them die, never watch them fade away, just turn your back on them, as you didn’t do it, as you didn’t just take a life…

As you weren’t the killer you are… The killer I was…


I blinked. Now, almost half an hour later, I was walking through the forest, trying to hold back my irritation. This blue-eyed, but – gotta admit – quite handsome, disaster was the reason for that. Yeah, I understood him, I understood his confusion and all, but I hated how bossy he was trying to be the whole time. He had no idea what was going on, and he was still trying to be bossy. Damn, guys like him pissed me off.

I knew it was a bit mean not to let my new companions look for their friend, but I had already found him – dead. I was afraid that they might just freak out if they saw his body, but there was something else, too. I was worried about them. I didn’t want the realization that they just lost someone close hit them the way it did to me all these years ago…

I glanced back and saw that the blue-eyed guy, who was obviously called Kellin, was watching me. I couldn’t tell if his look was angry, annoyed or just curious, but it definitely wasn’t friendly. Okay, good, then. Hate me all you want, it’s mutual. Bitch.

…Dammit, I don’t mean that shit.

I tried to smile reassuringly at him, but he had already looked away. Well, damn. And here goes nothing.

END OF CHAPTER 3.

Notes

This took me, like, ages to write, but it was fun. Again, I tried some new techniques, and since I recently read The Prestige... This book taught me a few things about POV's and how you can show the motives of both of the sides you're writing about (in this case, Kell and Vic). I also tried to add some nuances, to differ their styles of storytelling. Like, in Kellin's POV's, I added lots of a bit exaggerated descriptions; and Vic - obviously - curses a lot more than Kell. So yeah. I hope it worked.

The lyrics I used are from The First Punch by Pierce the Veil.

And damn. I just love writing from Vic's POV.

Feel free to add comments and all! :3

*EDIT* I noticed that obviously my autocorrect changed the world "stream" to "steam", so sorry if it confused you, I fixed it now.

Comments

I love this are you going to continue it?!?!?!?

veilsarepierced veilsarepierced
2/24/14
@zmswims19

The next update might take some time, I've been working on other things lately, but hopefully next week I might post a new chapter here too :3 Thank you, I'm glad you like it!
KingForADay KingForADay
8/20/13
Oh my gosh, update pleaseeeee!!! I'm obsessed with this!! Oh my goshhhh
zmswims19 zmswims19
8/20/13
@clairephernelia

Thank you :3
KingForADay KingForADay
7/28/13
**Shivers**

I love your writing omfg
clairephernelia clairephernelia
7/28/13