Suddenly I was slammed against the wall. One second I had been walking along a busy sidewalk and the next I was thrown into an alley's wall.
I was surrounded by a group of about eight men that ranged from fifty to fifteen. I remained relaxed, but was not delighted about the gun pointed straight at my head.
"Look girlie," the man that had grabbed me said nervously, "I don't want to hurt you. I just need money, but if you don't want to comply then we have our methods." The man was glancing around nervously as if he was afraid someone would come.
"You know you forgot to add the threatening line, 'If you scream then I'll give you a reason to scream.' That is a very important part of the villain part."
The man looked slight surprised, and slightly amused. He cocked the gun, "Okay then let's try something else. How about you hand over all the money that I know you are hiding in those pockets."
I reached in my pockets, and upturned them. A knife, a few quarters, and a bracelet made of iron fell out, "Why do you think that I actually have any money on me?"
The man looked slightly horrified at the contents at the little money, "But you attend Princeton High. You're a rich kid."
"I'm an orphan," I said with a snort, "I currently being forced to live with rich folks. I'm not going to owe them anything and take money." The man ripped my backpack off my shoulder, and threw it to one of the younger boys. He had bright purple hair, and looked surprised to find himself catching my bag.
"Look through it," the leader said gruffly, "See if she has anything useful in there." The boy looked at me, licked his lips nervously, and rummaged through my bag. He moved books, went through my empty wallet, and grabbed some of the loose change at the bottom of the bag.
He shook his head, "There's nothing in there." He looked around, "I mean there is like a few bucks in change, but there's nothing else useful or worth anything."
"What type of kid doesn't take money from their parents, especially when they're loaded?" The leading man asked.
"Um," I said pushing the gun away from my head, "A kid who doesn't like her foster parents." I suddenly brought my knee straight up into his stomach. I ducked as he swiped the gun at me when my knee kind of missed its spot. If I wanted to really kill him, it would have been enough to do it, so I purposely missed.
I took off at a run.
The human grabbed me around the shoulders and breathed his putrid breath on my neck. I grabbed his hands and jerked them off. I could hear the bones crunch with my acute sense of hearing. I whirled around and ripped his throat out.
The last thing he saw was a large grey wolf with a cross scar on its chest. I licked my lips, and turned my eyes onto the shaking group of humans that he led.
I eyed them coolly, and shook the blood stained grey hair from my dark golden eyes, "Does anyone else have any other idiotic idea about grabbing a tiger by the tail?" I asked darkly. A man, second in command of the gang, held out his shaky gun towards my chest.
His face had gone a ghostly white and I could see his body shake as his prey instincts told him to run, "Demon," he whimpered. With what was left of his courage, he ran toward me shooting wildly.
I dodged the first bullet, and leapt up. For a split second I could see his body as he whirled around looking for me, but then I landed on top of him. Any bone that was left unbroken after that was probably strewn around the alley.
I rose from my crouch to see the last of the men run around the corner. I gave a shrug and glanced around the dirtied alley. I decided to leave the human bodies there. I reached down and dusted off my sun glasses, which didn't break, and put them on. I glanced around for my bag.
I searched for a moment then a horrible thought occurred to me. I whipped my head to the side, and realized that my bag was gone.
When I had been jumped on of the youngest boys had grabbed my bag. He was probably running now, and that bag had my history essay in it. If I didn't turn that in I was going to completely fail junior year, and repeat the entire year.
I took off after the retreating men.
I slid into the busy sidewalk, and, despite my bloody appearance, remained completely unnoticed. I continued my lope in the direction in which I could smell fear quite heavily from for a few minutes before bright purple hair caught my attention.
I instantly recognized the boy with my backpack. I mean, his hair was literally bright, bright purple, so how was I not supposed to? I stopped my running, and slipped into the shade of the nearest building. I could see my bag, forgotten, over his shoulder as he passed in front of a phone again and again.
It was clear that he debated if he should call the cops about the murder, but the desire to protect himself must have won over in the end because he took off along the busy street. Deciding that there were too many witnesses, I followed him at a safe distance.
I waited for him to slip away from the crowd, and finally my chance came. The boy slipped into the park. With the sun barely still visible on the horizon, the boy trying to find his way to the hideout that was hidden in the forest beyond, and a killer on the loose, I wondered how humans had actually survived all this time.
The boy should have taken a right, but instead he took a left towards the old slimy pond. At first, I thought that he must be lost, but then I realized what was happening. He'd remembered that he was holding my backpack. I watched as he swung my bag from his shoulder, and tossed it into the pond.
My heart sank along with my bag. Another year of high school. I considered completely ripping the boy apart, but I let him pass. I had already killed two humans today, and I didn't need people searching for large dogs again. At least, that's what the teeth marks and the paw prints will have them looking for.
With the boy gone I shed my human appearance. I really didn't know how the forms changed back and forth. I don't think anyone really knew. Sometimes wolves couldn't see each other's human form unless all of them where in it, and other times we couldn't even tell a wolf and a human apart.
I slipped into the pond slowly. I was getting my bag, but I was also taking a bath. The blood easily washed out of my grey fur.
The pond was shallow for only a short while before it suddenly dropped off. Luckily my bag had been thrown onto the shallow part, and I didn't need to go for a full swim. I walked over my bag, and lowered my mouth around the strap.
I pulled my head up, and the water fell from the bag with a heavy stream. I slowly climbed out of the pond, and shook my fur dry. Realizing how late for school I was, I grabbed the wet bag in my mouth, and took off at a full out run towards my school.
Had I actually been thinking that day I would have realized that a white wolf had come to watch me swim in the pond. If I hadn't been so intent on rescuing my bag I would have seen the attention that the chubby, red headed kid and his dark skinned girlfriend showed in me as they followed the white wolf in human form. If I hadn't been so intent on getting to school, I would have noticed the smaller brown and white wolf wagging his tail happily to see me.
Had I noticed these things then I would have never gone to paradise, but the pack had already set their eyes on the familiar mark that scarred my chest. The mark that marked me as their friend, but what they did not realize is that while they were exactly as they were in their past life I wasn't any close to the man they were looking for.