Leaders of the Mislead

Chapter One: Dreams Only Last For A Night

Dedication Takes A Lifetime, But Dreams Only Last For A Night

Pounding feet, screaming coming from all directions, and black smoke covering the sky. That's all I was aware of as I ran through the littered street, cars were overturned and bodies lay all over the place. Dodging people left and right, I tried to make my way home, if anything happened to my family I'd regret it for the rest of my life.

Reaching back, I quickly checked to see how many bolts I had left and was dismayed to feel only 4 of my original 12, I'd better start conserving them. With this in mind I swept my eyes down the street I was running through, looking for some sort weapon. Almost anything would do, a baseball bat, shovel, anything! Then I realized where I was, the suburbs, the chances of anything lying around were slim to none. I should have stayed in my area, people always leave shit all over the place, trust me, I tripped over it often enough to know.

I tried getting out of the neighbourhood, but I kept getting lost, on a good day all these houses looked the same, but when the world's gone to shit, even the smallest recognizable features were gone. Normally I pride myself on being able to get from one place to another without getting lost, but my navigation skills seemed to have failed me.

A soft growl snapped me out of my reverie, sharply turning, I saw a puppy. It must have been a present for someone because it still had a big red bow tied around its neck. I took a closer look at the dog, and noticed that it had several small but deep scratches across its muzzle, almost as though it had gotten into a fight with something, and very narrowly won. I called to it softly, hoping to get a closer look at it, but it only tried to intimidate me by deepening its growl and pathetically snarling at me.

Figuring it'd be easier to walk away, I did just that. Metaphorically washing my hands of the pup, I continued my way down the street.

After walking for what felt like hours, I became of aware of how much quieter it had become. No one was screaming, there weren't any sirens blaring nor anyone yelling though a bullhorn.

This part of town was much quieter, there wasn't as much chaos here, probably because this was where the "second class" citizens lived. Up and down the street there were houses looking like they desperately needed a new coat of paint, fences that were leaning one way, if there were any boards left at all. There were toys abandoned in the yards, screen doors swaying, the hinges creaking every time. I still had no idea where I was, but judging by the state of houses, I must be getting closer to home.

As I was silently cursing myself for leaving my house, because whenever I do something bad almost always happens, something shiny caught my eye. Cautiously looking around, I started toward the patch of grass the shiny object was hidden in. If it turned out to be nothing more than a candy wrapper, I'd look like the biggest idiot on the earth, as if I hadn't embarrassed myself in this town enough, that is until I remembered there was no one to look like an idiot in front of.

Kneeling down, I inspected the object that had caught my attention. It was a small knife buried in a mess of leaves and grass, the blade was about 5 inches long and the handle roughly 4. The hilt had a deep emerald jewel embedded in it, and the blackr handle had silver writing engraved on it, and even though it wasn't in English and I wasn't religious, I could guess what "In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti" meant. Great, as if the world wasn't messed up enough, now there were religious nuts running around, probably thinking they were on a mission from God, as if they were angels or something.

The small dagger gave me an eerie feeling, maybe because it was hidden so well, someone was planning on coming back to it, there was no way it had fallen and hidden itself so cleverly. Despite the ominous feeling I got from the knife, it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, I opted to hold on to it since it would be a useful weapon.

I should probably try and find my home, maybe it's safer there now-

Sonofabitch!

There was a searing pain in my shoulder as something caught hold of me and dug its nails deeper into my muscle. It reminded me of when I used to play with my cat, and it would scratch me accidentally, only this was a thousand times more painful. As whatever clung to my arm, I pulled in the opposite direction, almost dislocating my shoulder in the process. Turning, I saw that it was my neighbour, well, it used to be my neighbour. Now it was just a dead body in a torn summer dress trying to eat me.

I felt another blast of pain, this time in the crook of my elbow. My neighbour had bitten me and it would only be a matter of time before I turned into one those things.

A.N

Hey guys, thanks for reading, I'll be posting the second chapter soon.
I'm probably going to be using song lyrics for Chapter titles, and Chapter One's title is
Stay Awake (Dreams Only Last for A Night) by All Time Low.

If you have any comments/suggestions please feel free to post them (: