Hello to all of the readers out there, just a little update before you begin reading the new chapter. Its been so long since I have posted a continuation for the story at hand. Its been too long and I apologize for the wait. Dealing with Thanksgiving and final exams at college just put me under a lot of stress and forced me to nearly eliminate my free time. Between studying, holiday stuff, hanging with friends, finishing projects that I never started, and work, I have just not put a lot of time into writing and that is something that I regret. My goal is to try and put out at least one chapter every other week, but I don't know how that will turn out. With being on break from college for a bit I should be able to do that much at least. Also I didn't completely stop writing in the time since I last uploaded. I was working on a little project for my friend because his birthday was coming up. He asked me to write him a story and I immediately thought up what I should give him. I took a while to write that, and I have that story all typed up and formatted on my computer. If anyone is interested in reading the skit that I made for him just let me know and I'll get around to uploading it. Leave me a message on any errors that you can point out or things that sound weird in your head. Thank you for reading and have a happy holiday.
Ash
A bullet whizzed by me as I ran through a bush. Robots had been attacking me ever since I had set food in this place, wherever it was. After less than a minute of following the robots tracks, more appeared and began to shoot at me. The first group that appeared was a group of roughly ten robots that were just like the other ones. I dealt with them quickly enough, but then more appeared and began to surround me. Even though I could destroy them quickly, getting surrounded was never a good idea. Even if I did decide to go against the odds and fight them all, there were too many unknowns to take into account. I didn't know where I was, I didn't know how many enemies there were, I didn't know who was attacking me, and I didn't know if there were any stronger robots coming after me. The list of things that I didn't know continued almost infinitely. The less I knew the more of a disadvantage I was at when fighting, or doing anything really. I wasn't about to let my ignorance be my downfall on this strange new world. Once I figured out who sent the robots and why then maybe I could begin to figure out a strategy to deal with them. After I decided that running past them was the best idea is when it truly became chaos. Robots appeared out of every place imaginable and chased me as I ran through the forest. Since I wasn't destroying them the numbers kept piling up, and pretty soon I had an army of robots chasing after me. The most troublesome thing was that after a few minutes I began to notice some different robots chasing me. The first type was easy to destroy and evade their attacks, however I didn't know the capabilities of the other ones. Some of the robots flew while others ran. There were ones that were bigger than others and ones that were smaller. They were all different to each other in some way and I could imagine that they would also fight differently as well. This was especially bad news for me considering the fact that if I messed up against one than the others would most certainly kill me on the spot. I had to figure out how they worked and how to fight them before I could come up with a plan of winning. I ducked my head to the left and a bullet flew by and grazed my quills. I sneered in annoyance as I felt where it had touched. I was trying to think of too many things while I was still under attack. If I was distracted then I would slip up and get shot. I needed to focus more on staying alive and less on everything else. I had a lot to do and I would be damned if carelessness got the best of me. I continued to run through the woods but now more careful to dodge the incoming fire. I saw a gap in the trees and ran right towards it.
I entered the clearing and immediately stopped running. I skidded to a halt and looked at the sight before me. Several hundred yards ahead of me was a structure the likes of which I had never seen. It was a large shinny dome that was well over thirty feet high. It was a greyish blue color that had some sort of insignia on it. The design looked like some kind of smiling skull with red spikes sticking out on either side. I didn't know what it meant, but at the moment I didn't have enough time to think about it. The structure was blocking my path and I didn't have anywhere else to run. The robots that had been chasing me began to appear from behind the trees that surrounded me on all sides. I was about to be cornered and that meant that I was about to be killed. I looked around on either side for an opening to slip past them but I didn't find any. As more and more emerged I realized that I was quickly running out of options. Suddenly, and idea formed in my head and I quickly made a plan. I took off running towards the structure that was directly ahead of me. If I ran fast enough then I would just run up and over it and hopefully lose the robots. I was gaining speed as I raced towards the structure and prepared to run over it. I turned around and took a quick look at the robots that had followed me here. They were standing there with their guns aimed at me but not firing. I was wondering why they stopped when some movement caught my attention. I turned my head back around and then quickly slid to a stop. The structure in front of me was moving and changing its shape. Surprised, I stood there and watched as the structure moved and revealed its secrets to me. All over small panels moved aside and showed holes in the dome. Out of those holes guns, rockets, and other weapons appeared and aimed their sights on me. I snarled in anger as I watched the transformation unfold. The structure was an enemy as well, and it was armed much more heavily than the robots were. I listened as the robots behind me grew closer and I thought about trying to take the dome head on. That notion died when I saw several large panels of the dome move away to reveal even more robots inside. The robots ran out of the structure and aimed their weapons on me as well. I stood there surrounded on all sides by the robots that had been attacking me ever since I got here. They were all focused on me, and so were the weapons that were jutting out of the dome.
As I stood there, I suddenly had an epiphany. I was running towards where the robots had come from, and they had led me here. I looked at the dome in front of me and finally made the mental connection. This is where the robots had come from. This is what I was running towards the whole time and it was also the thing that was trying to kill me. I had been so caught up in running, dodging, and thinking about other things that I had completely forgotten why I started running this way in the first place. I mentally berated myself as I realized my mistake. I was too unfocused. The nature, the beauty, the location, the robots, my plans, I was too distracted by all of these different things to notice the big picture. I was just so busy thinking about all of these different things that I completely lost track of what mattered most, my survival. The only way that I was going to have any hope of getting out of this alive was if I stopped thinking about everything so much and focused entirely on how I was going to survive. I held up my arms and took in a breath as I gauged the situation that I was in. I was surrounded at least two hundred to one by mechanical robots that could neither feel pain nor fear. They were all armed with guns and various other weapons that were both fast and deadly. I was completely surrounded on every side with no gaps in any direction. I also had a large building in front of me that was also adorned with many different weapons, all of which were trained on me. The building was also the source of where the robots were coming from which meant that there were probably even more robots inside. To top the whole situation off I had no idea where I was and this is where the robots came from, so they knew the terrain much better than I did. I was extremely annoyed that I had allowed myself to get caught up in such a mess less than an hour after I got here. All of my planning and preparation went to waste because I didn't take the time to think clearly. I wanted to find out who was attacking me and why, but right now that didn't matter that much. I began to think about how to escape when I thought of something else.
"No, I should care about who sent these. I should care about my plans and how I am going to enact them once I am done." I thought. A lesson that I had learned long ago reared its head in my mind and gave me a sense of clarity that I had previously lost. I have been thinking about how they are going to kill me, about how I am going to die. His voice popped into my mind and I remembered his words.
"As soon as you begin to wonder how you are going to die is when you give up all chance of staying alive. You mustn't ask how you are going to survive, but rather, what are you going to do when you survive."
An old friend had told me this a long time ago, and right now it was exactly what I needed to remember. I needed to focus purely on survival, and not the alternative. Death wasn't an option, and I wasn't about to let myself die for no reason. My mind returned to the present and I began to think of a solution. If I could get them to shoot at each other, the gun turrets at the robots, then that might create enough chaos for me to escape. Even if it didn't, I was fast enough to outrun their bullets before. Just because I had a lot more of them shooting at me didn't change the fact that I was faster and stronger than they were. Even if either of those two plans failed, I still had my backups. I thought of plan upon plan until I was sure that there was no possible way for me to die here. I had hundreds of different options at my disposal. Even though I didn't want to, I always had a few special tricks up my sleeve. I touched the rings that I had on my right and left wrists. Before I got here I was determined to not use these unless the situation was absolutely dire. I also wanted to save my other powers as secret weapons but now I realized that on this world I may end up needing to use them as much as my hands and feet. My mind was calm and my thoughts were collected as I took in the horde in front of me. Only a few seconds had passed in real time but in my mind I had spent nearly an hour thinking, reasoning, and plotting every move I could make. One thing that surprised me was that in the few seconds that I had sped up my mind the robots and dome weapons hadn't fired upon me. Still, I had no doubt that I was about to be engulfed in a maelstrom of bullets and fire. I turned away from the dome and crouched down. I took a running stance and waited for the guns to being to open fire on me so I could enact my plan of attack. I tensed up my muscles and prepared to take off the moment they began to fire. One second passed and I could feel the tension in my arms and legs grow. Another second passed and I was looking for the slightest hint of firing. Another second passed, and then another, and another, and another. Nearly five long seconds later I relaxed my muscles and stood straight up. All of the robots were aiming at me, and so was the dome that was now to my back. I looked around at the robots and wondered what was going on. They had been shooting me all this time and now that I was surrounded they stopped. There had to be some sort of reason for this behavior, and the more I thought about the alternatives, the more worried I became. A flashback of a wooden cage surfaced in my mind. The feeling of knives cutting into my flesh and spears constantly stabbing me became all too clear. I shivered as I remembered the pain and hopelessness that I had felt so long ago. I took in a breath and calmed myself. I would never let myself be captured like that again, no matter what. I pushed the memory aside and returned to the present. I was surrounded by enemies that weren't attacking me. They must want me alive for something, and if it was what I feared then I would destroy them all before they even get the chance. Suddenly I heard a noise that I had never heard before. I didn't know what it was, but I could tell that it was directly above me. I turned my head towards the sky to look at what was making it when I heard a person speak to me.
"Well, well, well, look at what we have here." The person said in a condescending manor. I looked up at the sky and saw a circular flying device hovering above me. The device was the source of the mysterious sound that I was hearing, and also the source of the voice I heard. The device flew in front of the dome and then began to fly lower until I could see it fully. The device looked like some kind of large fancy chair, and on the chair sat a very large creature that looked stranger than nearly anything I had seen before. I examined the creature for just a moment in order to try and learn what I could. I wasn't exactly sure whether it was male or female, but judging from its voice I would assume that it was male. The man was bald and didn't have any fur or hair except for a large red mustache. He was bulbous and dressed in a red coat that had many different zippers and buttons on it. He wore white gloves and black pants and smiled maliciously at me as he sat on the flying chair and looked down at me. On his head he had an object that jutted out like a set of horns. I could see that they were made of metal and therefore not a physical part of him. His eyes were wide and were very reflective. I stared at them for a moment before I realized that they weren't eyes. What I had though were large reflective eyes were actually pieces of glass that he had in front of his eyes. I remembered that I had met someone once who also used glass like that before. The word glasses appeared in my mind and I knew that it was what they were called. They were meant to be used in order to help people with poor vision see. Perhaps his species was naturally poor of sight. I took it all in as he spoke up once again.
"I'm sorry." He said. "I am being a terrible host. I don't believe I have had the pleasure to make your acquaintance yet. I am Doctor Eggman, and you are the pest who just showed up on my base and started destroying my robots!" He shouted.
"So he's the source of the robots." I thought to myself. If he was the source of the robots, and was also the one that built the dome, then he was surely a force to be reckoned with. I thought about that as he continued to speak.
"So tell me, just who do you think you are to come here all alone and try to disrupt my plans Hmm?" He finished.
I thought about what had happened, everything that he had said, and everything that I knew about this place. What I knew was that I had transported myself into the middle of a forest on a planet that I knew virtually nothing about. I was then attacked by his robots, but maybe I was the one who was wrong. He called this place his base which meant that it belonged to him. I didn't know whether he actually owned this area, but if he did then I was intruding on his property. If that was the case then even though in my mind I didn't do anything wrong, he might view me as an enemy who came here to steal from him or attack. I didn't know how things worked around here or who was in charge of what, but the probability that I was in the wrong was much higher than the probability that he had attacked me for no reason. I decided that I would try to negotiate my way out of this situation without any more conflict. If he was in any way reasonable then perhaps I could get off with only a few cuts and bruises. If things went well, I might even be able to make an ally. I cleared my mind and focused on putting on the facade that I wanted him to see. I mentally adjusted my tone and attitude into a more pleasant and friendly way. I would do my best to talk him over and see if I could even get his help, but if all else failed then I would make him regret the day he made me his enemy...
"First of all, let me begin by saying that it's an honor to meet you Doctor." I said with a smile, his expression turned from one of confidence to one of concern.
"You're saying it's an honor to meet me... And why exactly would that be?" He suspiciously asked. I continued to smile as I thought out my strategy. From his tone of voice and attitude he showed when he first spoke, I could tell that he viewed himself in high regard. A few compliments would get me far with him. I held my arms out in gesture to the robots all around.
"Why, just look at the army that is surrounding me. Anyone who commands such a force is deserving of honor in my opinion." I said. He continued to frown at me as he replied.
"Bah! This isn't even a trifle of power of the Eggman Empire. I have commanded forces that were hundreds of times this size!" He said. I gave no sign of worry as I replied to his comment.
"Then that is even more spectacular than I could have imagined. You know what they say about people with power." I said. He moved his flying chair closer to me and I got a much more detailed look at him. He was several feet away as he stared at me curiously.
"And what do they say about people with power?" He asked. I smiled even wider as I replied.
"They're the only people worth following." I said. He smiled wide in response and I smiled back. Everything was going according to plan and that was good news for me. Eggman moved his chair back a few feet and continued to smile at me.
"Right you are. The people who have power are the only people that matter in the end." He said. I smiled both outside and in as I took in his words. This person may have had a robot army at his command, but that didn't matter if I could control him with my words. I didn't know whether I would be able to or not but so far all of my methods were working fine. First I had opened up with a compliment towards him and his army. Even though he didn't take it at first I kept the praise coming and he eventually opened up. Then I tried to juice him for information. Based off of how he spoke and the situation I was in I made a general statement that I allowed him to interpret. After I studied his response, I followed up by saying something that I calculated would have a positive effect on him. The more we spoke the more I learned about him and how to best talk him into giving me what I wanted. These are the basics of manipulation and it was something that I had studied for a long time in order to master. This Eggman may have been of a species that I had never seen before, but I could read him like a book and get exactly what I wanted. I thought of my next words carefully before I said them.
"Well I don't think that is quite true. After all, how can you feed a glorious fire without chopping up and throwing in all the pieces of wood lying around." I said. Eggman began to stroke his mustache as he smile even wider.
"Heh, good point." He said. I nodded my head in response and spoke again.
"I'm sorry, you told me who you are but I don't believe I have introduced myself yet." I said. I bowed to him as I continued.
"My name is Ash, and I'm new around here." I said. I stood up and looked at him after I was done bowing. Eggman was stroking his chin with his right had as he looked at me inquisitively.
"Hmm, interesting. And just where exactly did you come from?" He asked. I thought of an answer that wouldn't give too much away.
"From somewhere very different than this place." I said. I could tell that my answer didn't satisfy him so I decided to change the subject.
"As for my intrusion, I apologize for destroying your robots. I didn't know that I was on your base, and I didn't know that they were yours." I said. I hoped that if I apologized then perhaps he would forgive me. If he didn't then I would have to think about my next words very carefully. Eggman began to smile devilishly at me as he replied.
"Well that is very unfortunate. You see, even though you didn't know that they were my robots, you destroyed them all the same, and no one destroys my stuff and gets away with it." He said. I knew what was about to happen but I decided to keep up my guise.
"And what do you plan on doing?" I asked. He looked genuinely happy as he responded.
"I'm going to kill you of course! Surly people do that where you come from!" He said. He took a quick look around himself and then gestured to all the robots that surrounded me.
"In case you haven't noticed, you're outnumbered, outgunned and on my turf. You just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time." He said. I didn't let him see my concern. I closed my eyes and shrugged while giving a close lipped smile.
"Oh come now. Do you honestly think these many robots will kill me? The only reason I ran from them was because I wanted to find you, the man who sent them. I could destroy all these robots without breaking a sweat." I said. It was true that I could do that, but only because I had lived in the desert and nearly never sweat. I was indeed worried about the robots but only because I didn't know all of their capabilities. Ignorance was what I truly feared, because ignorance has the power to defeat anyone. I didn't know what all of the other robots could do, or what the dome could for that matter. All of the unknowns put me at such a disadvantage that I really wanted to avoid fighting as much as possible. However, I had defeated the first few robots with ease, and if the rest were like them then I didn't have anything to fear at all. I could in fact destroy them all with ease if this was all he had, but he probably had more. I decided to keep on talking to see if I could get anywhere with him.
"Besides, you look more like a man of opportunity then someone who destroys without getting something in return. And I have an opportunity for you, if you're interested?" I said. Eggman moved his chair closer towards me again. This time he continued to advance until he was just over one foot away from me. The grin on his face was easy to see and I could tell that I had piqued his interests.
"Go on..." He said. I continued to smile and give off a friendly demeanor.
"It just so happens that I have been looking for a way to get ahead in the world, advance my ranking as it were. You look like someone who is on your way to the top, and I want to know if I could tag along for the ride." I said. I widened my smile and put all my effort into getting my message across.
"I want to have power, and you're just the man to give it to me. If I worked for you, then I could help myself by helping you get to the top and take over the world. What do you say, do you think you could use some more muscle in your army?" I asked. He smiled even wider as he listened to my speech. I made sure to smile nearly as wide and with just as much joy as he had. I had won, chosen my words carefully, made sure to word them right, and give him exactly what he wanted. He stroked his mustache as he replied.
"Oh that sounds like a wonderful idea." He said. I smiled in response as I held out my hand to him.
"Well then, it will be nice working for you Doctor." I said. I would work for and learn from him and do whatever he asked me to do. I've done it before and if it meant getting ahead then I would gladly do it again. I didn't mind stooping down to work for someone else, as long as I got what I wanted in the end. If he turned out to get in my way then I would do whatever to ensure complete victory. I waited for him to shake my hand, but instead he sat there in his chair that hovered off of the ground. After a few more seconds I looked at him for an answer and saw that he was still smiling just as maliciously.
"Yes it sounds like a wonderful idea, but unfortunately for you, I have a strict no hedgehog policy that I plan to uphold." He said. I took my arm back as he began to fly away. I let my guise drop and replaced my friendless with my usual expressionless tone.
"Besides, I'm already working with less than as many Mobians as I can stomach. I would much rather work with more robots instead." He said. I clenched my fists as I looked at Eggman. I knew that it probably wouldn't do any good but I decided to try talking to him one last time.
"So you won't let me join, even though I offered to work under you?" I asked. Eggman answered in a bland tone of voice.
"Oh come on. Did you really think I wouldn't notice what you were doing? I am the king of manipulation and I certainly know it when I see it. You did a good job of hiding it I'll admit that, but you were just planning on betraying me as soon as I got in the way of your plans." He said. I scowled at him as he continued to speak.
"I don't need another Mobian working for me, and I certainly don't need another Shadow to happen." He said. The way he worded that caught my attention and I immediately thought about what he meant. He said Shadow like he would a person's name, like someone he didn't like. If I reacted to his name then Eggman would know that I knew him, but since we were about to fight it didn't really matter to much if he did. If Eggman could tell me where Shadow was then that would make my job much easier. I looked up at Eggman and decided to risk it.
"You said Shadow, as in Shadow the Hedgehog?" I asked him. Eggman looked surprised by my remark. He floated a little closer to me and leaned forwards in his chair.
"Oh, so you know him then?" He asked in a light tone. My thoughts turned to Shadow and the time we had spent together. As I stood there surrounded by robots I began to remember the first night we had met, the first night we spent together, and the first night of my decent into hell.
The Past
The fire crackled as I watched the flames dance above the firewood. The flame cast shadows on the desert sand that danced around jumped from place to place. I watched the flames as the wood burned and gave me warmth and comfort. Shadow threw a piece of wood into the fire and it disappeared amongst the other pieces of wood we had gathered. I thought about my situation for the first time we had left. I was sitting on a piece of wood in the middle of nowhere with a strange man sitting across from me who I had only just met. Never could I have imagined that this is what would happen to me. As much as I hoped and prayed I never thought that I would actually survive, let alone find someone else. Now I was alive and well and wondering just what would happen next. The word prayer stuck in my mind and I began to think about it. On the first day I was alone I spent the entire day trying to dig through the rubble that had trapped my parents. It wasn't until the third day that I had begun to pray that they survived. I didn't exactly know what praying was, or how it helped, but my mom used to do it all the time and she always told me to do it. Praying was kind of like wishing, but if you prayed enough then eventually your wishes would come true. She prayed for things like more food and water, and supplies when we needed them. She also said that she prayed prayers of thanks whenever we found anything of value. I don't know how it worked but praying was supposed to help us get what we wanted. I had done exactly what my mother had taught me and I closed my eyes. I bowed my head to the ground like my mom had taught me and I had prayed and prayed for hours that they would come back and that everything would be alright. After the fourth day I gave up on praying and instead focused on trying to survive. I did what I could, but in the end I was dying and there was nothing I could do. I tried praying, and then I had tried surviving. Surviving ended up keeping me alive longer, but unlike praying I wasn't very good at it. How I survived I don't think I'll ever know. The only thing that I was sure of, was that I needed to get better at surviving. I broke away from my thoughts and looked over at the man who saved me. He sat there with his cloak in a pile to his left and with his backpack on his right. He was jabbing the fire with a long piece of wood and every now and again I would see sparks fly up and disappear.
After we had spent hours walking through the desert it started to get dark, he stopped and suggested that we build a fire. I followed him as he walked over to a patch of small buildings that were nearby. As we walked I looked at each of the buildings and remembered that my parents had gone there in order to look for supplies. They had told me that they hadn't found anything of interest and that no one was there. I asked Shadow why we didn't stay in the buildings but he responded by giving me a strange look and telling me that he didn't want to bother the ghosts. I continued to walk with him but after a few minutes I began to feel like I was being watched. I thought that maybe there was something other than ghosts living in those buildings. The sun was much lower in the sky before Shadow had found enough kindling to make a fire that would last a while. He carried the wood away from the buildings and placed some of it in a pile. He started the fire and we had sat around it in silence since. Even though there wasn't much else to do, I didn't want to break the silence between us. I hadn't spoken much since I lost my parents, and even though I wanted to talk to someone, I was scared that if I started to then he would leave me. I spent most of my time on my own either surviving or thinking about my life. I wanted to talk to him, to say something, but instead I decided to simply think some more now that I had something to think about. I took my eyes away from him and looked up at the night's sky. I had seen them all before, many times over, but I still enjoyed looking at them. To me the stars were the light that was always within the deepest darkness. My parents used to tell me that within all evil, wherever there was darkness or pain, there would always be a tiny light inside, a light called hope. I didn't know how much I believed that anymore. The only hope I had left, was that I would continue to survive, and perhaps, begin to live.
I looked back down and noticed Shadow staring at me over the campfire that he had built. His expression was cold, and angry looking as he stared at me with the fire reflecting in his eyes. I looked back at him and wondered what he wanted. He reached over and grabbed his backpack that was laying at his side. He pulled it onto his lap and opened it up and pulled something out. It was hard to see what it was in the dark, but when he moved it closer to the fire I could see that it was bread.
"Hungry?" He asked. Shadow held the bread in his hands and I stared at it all the while. I licked my lips without thinking about it and then realized what I did. I looked down at the ground as I replied to him.
"I'll live." I said. Earlier in the day I had collapsed because of how hungry I was. Shadow gave me some of his food and a little more water to wash it down. I knew that I shouldn't take more than I needed. It was his water and his food, he deserved it much more than me. I was grateful that he had decided to save me in the first place. I wanted to make sure that I wasn't a burden and that I didn't take without asking. I thought about the bread and how good it tasted as I looked down at the ground. Before I knew it, a shadow was looming over me and blocking the fire from view. I looked up and saw him standing there as he held the bread and the water canister out to me. I didn't know what to do, so I didn't do anything. Another moment passed and then he pressed the bread and water into my hands before he walked away and sat down on the other side of the fire. I looked at the objects in my hands and then at Shadow who still looked angry because of the fire light.
"I can go a while without any food." He said. I began to protest until I heard the rest. "Eat what you want, and don't complain about it." He said. I closed my mouth and looked down at the food in front of me. I tore off bits and pieces of bread and eagerly shoved them into my mouth. Before I knew it I had eaten it all and was left with only the water container. I took a few gulps full and then I closed the cap and held it at my side. It was alright for me to eat the bread since he told me to, but I knew better than to drink all the water without a second thought. I looked over across the fire and at Shadow who had been watching me the whole time.
"We haven't talked much." he said in that low, flat voice of his, "I have a couple questions I want to ask you." I pulled my legs up and hugged myself in order to keep warm. I continued to stare at him and wait for whatever questions he wanted to ask me.
"Do you know how to defend yourself?" He asked. I gave him a puzzling look and didn't respond. I didn't exactly know what he meant so I wasn't sure of how to respond. I continued to look at him until he seemed to understand why I didn't reply.
"Have you ever been in a fight?" He asked. I felt a pain in my head as I remembered something. It felt like the memory had crashed into my skull and was taking up too much room. At first I remembered smells and sounds, and then colors and feelings. An image of a face appeared in my mind and I immediately wanted to throw up. I didn't want to remember, I didn't want to, but when I looked at Shadow and saw his face in the darkness I was compelled to tell him the truth. I looked at him and nodded in response. He continued.
"Who did you fight with?" He asked. I wanted him to stop asking questions, or to ask about something else, but I didn't know how to avoid this conversation, and I knew that I didn't want to lie.
"I don't know." I responded.
"What do you mean you don't know?" He asked with curiosity in his voice. I saw his face in my mind and the smell of his breath as he breathed on me. I swallowed and forced the bile down my throat. I had just eaten food and there was no way that I was going to throw it up.
"I didn't know who he was." I answered.
"How did the fight turn out?" He asked. I remembered his face in front of mine, his hands as he held me down, the fear of what would come next, and then the blood...
I took a moment to collect myself and then I answered in a tone I never thought I could make.
"I killed him." I said.
Shadow looked at me with surprise and disbelief clear in his face. He continued to look at me like that as he tried to figure out whether I was lying or telling the truth. After a few moments he began to talk again.
"How old are you?" He asked. I had to think about his question before I came up with a response, and that was a good thing. I tried to block the memory from my mind and instead figure out how old I am. My birthday was something my parents had always said was important, but dates didn't mean much to them. They knew how old I was based off of how many times them moon went from dark to light. It had been a while now, and I remembered that my parents said my birthday was going to be soon. I began to draw lines in the sand with my foot. After I had drawn enough I looked at him and spoke.
"This is how old I will be in a few days." I said. His eyes widened in response to my answer. The look of surprise on his face was clear.
"You're that old. Are you sure?" He asked. I looked at him and nodded as he continued to stare at me disbelieving. I didn't understand why he was so surprised, so I thought about it for a moment. Maybe people who were as young as me wouldn't have survived for as long as I have. Even though I nearly died I had still managed to hang on to life, and do whatever it took to survive. He continued to look at me in that way for a little bit longer. Finally, his expression changed and he began to look more serious than astounded. He began to ask me more questions.
"And how long ago was it that you fought this person?" He asked.
"Three days before I met you." I answered. He thought about my response in silence for a minute. After that he asked me some more questions.
"So this was right after your parents died then, just a few days ago." He said. I didn't respond but instead stared at him blankly. I didn't want to keep talking about this, I wanted him to stop, but he kept asking me questions and the memory kept returning to my mind.
"How did you kill him?" He asked. I began to picture it in my mind and I immediately tried to think about something else. I didn't want to remember that, I didn't want to talk anymore. All I wanted to do was sit near the fire and forget about what had happened. I looked at Shadow and decided to tell him.
"I... I don't want to talk about his anymore." I said. I pulled my feet up closer and I looked towards the ground. I wanted to forget, I wanted to so badly. Whenever I thought about it I began to feel sick, and cold, and scared of what happened. It wasn't like anything else that I had done before. It was the worst thing that I had ever felt and I never wanted to feel it again. When I looked up I saw Shadow as he continued to stare at me from across the fire. His eyes were unrelenting, and when I looked at him I immediately wanted to look away. I looked back to the ground and stared at the sand for a moment before I heard him speak.
"I want to know how you killed him." He said. I took in a sharp breath and exhaled just as quickly.
"I don't want to talk anymore." I said. I wanted him to stop asking me questions. I wanted him to understand how much those memories hurt me. I wanted someone to hug me and tell me everything was going to be alright. I wanted those things, but I knew that none of them would happen. Shadow quickly stood up and I watched as he did. He walked around the fire and stood directly in front of me. I looked up at him and felt a fear that I hadn't felt in what seemed like ages. He stood there and stared as he spoke again.
"Tell me how." He commanded. I forced down the saliva that had been building up in my mouth. I didn't want to think about it, but I was too scared of Shadow to not do what I was told. I thought back to the day and began to recall everything that had happened. Once I could imagine it clearly, I began to describe it to him.
"There was a man, who was big and covered in fur. I didn't know who he was, or why he was there, but I thought that maybe he could help." I said. I began to rock back and forth as I continued to describe what happened next.
"My parents were buried under a building, and I was too weak to dig them out. I thought that he could help me, that maybe I could save my parents." I said. I didn't know when, but I had started to rock faster the more I spoke. Everything that I described to Shadow I remembered exactly as it happened.
"I walked up to him, and begged him to help me, but when he saw me he got a strange look in his eye." I said. I realized that I was breathing faster now, but I continued on.
"He said that he didn't want to help me, and that he wanted something else instead..." I rocked in silence for a few moments as I gathered my voice.
"He grabbed my arms, and then he pushed me down. He got on top of me, and he held me beneath him. And then his moved his face closer to mine, and I could smell his breath, and then smiled and laughed, and then, and then, and then..." I repeated. I could feel the tears as they formed in my eyes. I remembered what happened next in vivid detail.
"There was blood, so much blood. It was everywhere, and he wasn't anywhere, but he was. There was fur, and bones, and body parts, and blood, and I was covered in it, and all I could see was red, and then I ran to the house and covered myself in Ashes, so that I could get the blood out. I scrubbed, and scrubbed, until I couldn't see the blood anymore. And then I cried, and then I laid there, and I remembered, and felt, and I did nothing..." I said. I was rocking back and forth and breathing really fast. I was crying and hugging myself as I stared into the fire. The worst part was the blood, all of the blood that was everywhere. Even now I could smell it, smell it on the sand, on the bricks, on my skin. I continued to rock in silence as I forgot about the memory. I told him everything, so there wasn't a reason to remember it anymore. After a while I looked up at Shadow who was still standing in front of me. He stood there and looked down at me but no longer with that scary face he had. In his eyes I saw something that I had never seen before in anyone else. I had never seen it, but I knew what it was just by looking. Even though he wasn't crying, even though he was breathing normally, I could tell that he was sad after hearing my story. He looked at me silently with his sad eyes and we stared at each other in silence as the fire crackled behind us.
"It must have been hard on you, losing your parents, trying to survive, killing another person." He said. I looked down at the ground and avoided his gaze. I looked at his shoes but didn't focus on him as I listened to the rest of his words.
"What you went through was horrible, but it is far from the worst I have seen." He said. I felt a change in his tone so I looked back up at him. The sorrow in his eyes were gone and instead replaced by a cold emotionless expression that made him look like he was dead inside.
"This world is harsh, and it doesn't have any room for the weak. The truth is that what you have gone through is only the beginning, and in the end you will probably have to kill many more people in order to survive." He said. The smell of blood filled my nostrils as I thought about killing someone else. It was hard enough killing one person, but I couldn't imagine needing or wanting to kill more. I looked into his eyes and saw no emotion in them. It looked like it had all drained away in the time that he had lived. I continued to stare at him as he talked some more.
"You need to learn how to fight in order to survive. If you don't know how to defend yourself when I leave you, then you'll be defenseless and die without a purpose." He said. I didn't know what I had thought before, what would happen between us, but him telling me that he would leave me filled me with a sense of loneliness, and sorrow. When he was gone it would just be me, by myself, alone. I didn't want it to be that way, I wanted him to stay with me. I wanted him to say that he would stay, but I knew that he wouldn't. I didn't want to fight, I didn't want him to leave, and I didn't want to kill anyone. Everything that I had ever known before was gone, and I had no idea what would happen to me from here. I was sad, and scared, and tired, of everything that had happened. I let those emotions fill me with their presence, but then I began to feel something else. Admits all of the negative, dark emotions that were clouding my mind, I began to feel something else gradually replace them. At first I didn't know what it was, but after a while I finally figured it out. It was peace. I may not have known what was going to happen to me, or what else I would have to do, but I did know something that would come to pass. Shadow would leave me, and then I would be on my own. It wasn't the thought of being on my own that brought the sense of peace, but rather knowing something that was real, knowing something that would happen without a doubt, knowing something that was completely true. I felt much more calm as I focused on the truth.
"Okay," I said in a low voice. I may not have known what would happen next, but it didn't matter as much right now. I would train with Shadow, and then I would be able to survive on my own, and that gave me just a little bit of peace as well. Shadow began to walk towards me. He walked over and then sat down on my left side. Before I knew it, he put his right arm around me and held me there. I could feel the heat of his body near mine, the beat of his heart, the closeness of him to me. For the first time since my parents had died I had felt safe, I had felt secure. This single motion had comforted me, and calmed me in a way I didn't know possible. It was like how my father used to hold me when I was scared or unsure. I moved my head and looked up at Shadow as he held me with his arm.
"Lesson one." He said. He moved his arm quickly and punched me in the face. I was knocked off of the log and thrown unto the sand. My head was spinning and I saw images floating around me. I moved my hand to my face and felt blood coming out of my nose. I looked at his cold, emotionless face with astonishment and fear in my eyes.
"Never let your guard down." He said. He moved back to the log he was sitting on and he laid down next to it, close to the fire in order to keep himself warm. I sat there in the sand, bleeding from my nose as the first of our many nights together ended and turned to day.
Chapter 3