I personally find this chapter confusing and crappy, but I'm only one person. I'd like to hear your thoughts on the story so far. The little green review button tempts you! Do not deny the button!

Chapter 4: The Voices Never Lie

Abandoned cars littered the streets and the shops lining them were empty. Angry crowds gathered closer to the center of town, where several policemen were trying to calm them down.

"Okay people, wrap it up! Everything's under control here!" That and similar shouts echoed throughout the square, but no one paid any attention. They were demanding to know what was going on and that they would sue them for god-knows-what.

Todd pushed his way through the crowd until he saw a circle of police forcefully pushing them away, ignoring their protests. One man's yell rang above everyone else's, quieting them down.

He stepped out between the officers, seeming to have a speech in mind. "Everyone! As you can see, the entire situation is NOT under control! These cops want to avoid spreading panic, but I say that we have a right to know what's going on... If they even know what it is themselves! These are becoming dark times, literally, and we have to stay calm if we're going to get through-"

His speech was cut off by a cop roughly pushing him to the ground. "This is nothing but a normal power failure!!" He shouted, trying to win over the crowd again.

"Then why aren't the cars working?" "How come torches are off?" "MY TOILET WON'T FLUSH!!" Contradictions rang through the air until it was all just noise, incomprehensible and annoying.

If Squee had more charisma, hell, if he liked people at all, he would have gone up there and told them about the barrier. But he wasn't, so he didn't. Instead he seethed inside, wondering how long it would take until this got violent.

As it appears, the second he had that thought, a woman next to him pulled a gun on the crowd. She screamed for everyone to be quiet, and they complied. The police officers just stared at her as the crowd reformed around her.

"As you can see, the law is failing along with the power. We can do anything we want without consequences! Why should we stay calm when panicking and rioting will have exactly the same result? We are human, and we can't help our destructive nature." Her voice was low and calm, but the gun was shaky in her hand. She was trying to win over the crowd at gunpoint, which would never end well. "Nobody lives forever," She said finally. And, to prove her point, she grabbed Todd roughly by the collar, thrusting the burning cold metal into the back of his neck.

Todd stayed as calm as his racing heart would let him. This wasn't the first time he had been held at gunpoint... But last time was a seven-year-old that made Todd play Barbie with her, and neither of them realised that the safety was still on. He was breathing heavily as the woman spun around for all to see her hostage.

The police finally recovered and took their guns out quickly, all aimed at the woman, but they were still lost for words. The woman just chuckled, holding Todd between her and the police. He grinned nervously and waved to the cops, but the woman pressed the gun harder into his skull. He dropped his hand.

There was a shout coming from the crowd, a girl's voice telling the woman to let Todd go. The cops and the woman all looked towards the voice, and Todd took his chance gratefully. He slipped underneath the gun and swept her legs out from under her. He wrestled out of her grasp and ran. Todd raced through the crowd, intending to run straight home, but the crowd parted for him revealing a policeman. He grabbed Todd by the shoulder.

Three more cops surrounded the woman on the ground and arrested her, leading her to the car. Then they were at a loss at what to do, because none of the cars were working.

"I'd just like to ask you a few questions," the cop said importantly, seemingly unaware that being held hostage at gunpoint was a bad thing and would have a somewhat negative effect on the victim.

Todd raised an eyebrow. "Didn't you just see everything that happened?"

"That's not relevant to the procedure." He continued to ask questions that had nothing to do with what had just transpired in the square, until Todd was just too tired of their ignorance to stay silent any longer.

"Ugh! You people are so stupid! Can't you see that what she said was true? This town is going to fall apart if you don't get off your lazy asses and take some initiative! And I don't mean to calm down a crowd. You have to do more than that. Run this crappy little city until we can contact thr outside world, then maybe we can get through this!" Todd took a deep breath and jerked out of the policemen's hold.

He looked around, embarrassed and furious, to see that the crowd had reformed around himself this time, the arrested criminal ignored completely. He glared at them all, but one face caught his attention.

The girl from the barrier nodded once, and disappeared into the crowd. She was there and gone so quick that Todd wondered if he had really seen her at all. As he slipped in between the cops and left the square, he wondered if it was her that had distracted his captor.

Todd made his way along the decaying streets, eventually noticing something extremely disturbing; The trees in the distance were swaying slightly, but there was no wind at all.

-X-

A few hours later, Todd was still wandering the rapidly darkening streets. He didn't want to go back to his abusive parents, but he couldn't think of anywhere else to go, so he just kept walking until his feet brought him to a near-destroyed street. Graffiti lined the dirty walls, almost every shop had been broken into and looted. One of them was on fire. It amazed and sickened him how people could sabotage themselves so much after only two days without power.

But maybe it wasn't that. Maybe they felt it, too... the chill, and the whispers. Maybe they knew this wasn't normal.

Avoiding that street entirely, the boy found himself in a part of town he hadn't been in before. It had a foreboding air about it, the elongated shadows flooding the street with darkness. his boots clicked on the concrete too loud for his comfort.

As he turned a corner, he heard something. Voices coming from inside a shop with a broken window. Knowing how dangerous anyone could be at this time, he hid behind a pile of packing crates and was about to make a run for it, but he froze at what he heard.

They were male voices, and they were laughing. "Come on, sweetie. Don't be shy," One said. You could hear the greasiness in his voice, and Todd suddenly didn't want to be anywhere near this place. But his body wouldn't obey him, feet frozen to the concrete on which he crouched.

"Boys, let us not hurt the child," A woman's voice chimed in. "Not yet." She chuckled, followed by the deep voices of the men. "We need her alive and well for a few more minutes."

There was the sound of a struggle, then a heavy thud. A high-pitched scream filled the air, but was cut off too suddenly for comfort. "Tell us where it is, girly! Or..." The man chuckled, and Todd shuddered at the thought of what could be going on in there.

Another female voice could be heard, small at first, but still determined. And also sickeningly familiar. "Get away from me. I told you idiots that I made it up! Ugh, I can smell your stupidity from here!"

It was the girl from the barrier. Insane, but the only person Todd had ever met that was bearable to be around.

Suddenly the air felt cold. Freezing - literally. Frost coated the crates in front of Todd's face and ice ran through his veins. A weight seemed to fall onto his mind, numbing his senses until he had to fight to keep from falling unconscious. A voice entered his mind, neither male nor female, but holding the majesty and power of something older than time. 'Save her.'

It wasn't Shmee.

'She needs to complete her task before she can truly leave this world. Save her...' Those words echoed in his head, dragging him to his knees. That wasn't a statement. It was an order. And Todd couldn't refuse.

He stood up and the ice melted around him, leaving Todd shivering. The weight of the command had left, but the memory of it stayed, and that was enough to push him onwards. As he left his hiding place, he also left his sanity.

The scene he saw in his mind was pretty close to the reality of it. He could see the backs of two men, and another was holding the nameless girl in an armlock. The woman was standing beside them, grinning. She had a long dagger in her hand, and held it like she knew how to use it. It was already covered in blood.

-X-

It was no use struggling; the man had her locked solidly in place. The other two seemed to be on every side, and she was scared to wonder what they would do to her when the woman said she was done.

There were no tears. There were no screams. The girl seemed like she didn't care one bit about what was going on, and that just made them more determined to get a reaction out of her. So they killed him. The man that had offered her shelter for the night. Though she hated his daughter and the daughter returned the feeling, it was the only place the girl could have stayed. How will she tell the other girl that her father is dead?

And the things they threatened to do to her now had pushed her over the edge. She had no memory of her life before last week, so she believed that she had nothing to lose. Because of that, the girl decided to taunt her assaulters to no end. She would die before they had their way with her.

The girl had not denied her death. She had not merely accepted it. She had embraced it, as a relief from the horrors of this new world she lived in. But a small part of her told her not to. It told her to fight. Drowning that part out, she braced herself for the final insult that would lead to the final blow.

The words never left her mouth. She could have sworn she saw a shadow move independently of the others.

The shadow moved again, this time towards the people in the room. Suddenly, a man in front of her slid to the ground, unconscious. In his place was a thin, dark figure with eyes that seemed to give off their own light. He held a long blade that had belonged to the woman not too long ago.

Then she recognised the figure. "Squee?!" Something jolted inside her, and white flashed in front of her eyes. She remembered... something... Kita; Kiah; Keebler... It was her name... But then it was gone, too quick to make any sense, and she was thrust back into this hateful reality.

Not taking any chances, the girl used the distraction to slip out of the man's grasp, much like she had seen Todd do in the square, only this was more practiced. She didn't remember how or when she learnt it, but this skill came to her naturally.

Though terror was raging through her body, she did not run. She fought.

-X-

Todd expected her to flee the scene, knowing how close she had come to being raped and murdered, but she didn't. The girl stayed by his side, and he was grateful. He would never have won this fight without the element of surprise on his side, and now that that had expired, he would have been facing two grown men alone, armed with only a knife he hardly knew how to use.

The girl took the knife out of Todd's hand and grabbed her former captor's hair, dragging him down to look him in the eye. Then she slit his throat. Blood spilled onto her hands and sprayed her face, so she threw the body to the ground and grinned at the other man who was watching in horror.

The woman came up from behind them, catching Todd by surprise. He ducked under a punch and kicked her in the stomach, making her crumple. She hissed at him and fled, dodging a slice from the girl.

The other man watched his leader run, and he, too, abandoned the fight with what little dignity he had left.

"We'll get you! We'll kill you both, you little vermin!" With that, he turned and fled, leaving the two kids injured and alone with two bodies and one unconscious criminal.

Todd walked over to the man that was tormenting the girl before to check his pulse. He had hit him pretty hard on the head, and Todd wasn't sure weather he wanted him to be alive or not.

It was difficult to find, but the man's heart was beating. Todd stood up, disgusted, and kicked him in the groin. The man groaned and curled into a ball.

Todd shivered as the air started to feel cold again. The weight entered his mind, and he clutched his head as if to squeeze it out of him.

'Finish the job...' Todd's knife hand twitched, and he had to use all the strength in his body not to bring it down into the man's flesh. He fell to his knees and threw the knife away, letting is skitter across the floor. The voice chuckled. 'You are too weak now, but in time, it will happen. There is no escaping your fate, Todd.'

"No!" He gasped. The pressure lifted, leaving Todd empty. He just stared at the unconscious man, trying to prevent himself from falling into that same oblivion.

"Are you okay?" Todd jumped as he heard the girl's voice close beside him. He turned to see her looking at him with a concerned expression.

Todd let the tiniest of smiles play on his lips. "I think I should be asking you the same question. You were the one being held captive by those... monsters." Even the thought of being human made him sick when he saw how twisted they really were.

The girl nodded. "True, but that was only externally. You have been just as tormented as I have, only internally." Her face was deadly serious when she saw the shock on his face. "It doesn't take a genius to know when something supernatural is going on... I know you're being haunted by something."

Todd was still shocked. For one thing, her logic was sick. And he could also see she wasn't telling the whole truth. He was about to argue with her, but when he looked over, she was gone. He stood up shakily and scanned the room.

Todd saw her walking out the half-destroyed door, and called her back. "Hey! Wait a minute!" It was the he wished he knew her name.

The girl had rounded the corner before he could catch her. Sighing, Todd glanced back into the room and jumped when he saw the girl standing right behind him. "How did you...?"

The girl just shrugged and her serious expression faded, giving way to a large grin. She held out a bloody hand, saying, "Kaya. You can call me Kaya."

Todd just stared at the hand, and the girl only then realised that it was still covered in blood. She dropped her hand and nodded at him instead. She was insanely creepy, and creepily insane, but she was okay when it came to being human. "Thanks. It feels better to know the name of the Almighty Creepy One. When did you remember?" He asked.

She hesitated, then said, "I didn't, really. I just like the name." Her face fell, and looked sadly back at a fallen man Todd didn't notice before. "I guess... I guess I have a family to inform," She said, her grin fading as fast as it had come.

Todd glanced at the body and nodded, but he wasn't going to let her run off like before. He needed her to answer one question first. "How do you know I hear voices?"

The girl looked around awkwardly, obviously avoiding the question. When it looked like Todd was about to storm away, she put a hand up. "Don't go," She pleaded. "I... I don't remember. I... uh, I don't remember how I know. I just do."

She sounded uncertain, but she seemed to sound like that a lot, so Todd believed her. He just nodded, needing to leave this shop and everything to do with it alone.

Don't make me do that again, He thought to the voice angrily, staring at his bloody hands. I don't want to be judge, jury and executioner, and I can't kill people. I'm not going to, and you can't make me.

'We'll see...' It was but an echo of the power the voice held when it told him to save the girl, Kaya, but it was still powerful enough for him to need to shake his head to clear it.

The girl grinned halfheartedly and sprinted out of the shop, leaving Todd alone. He would find his way back home sooner or later, and until then, he would strive to forget all that had happened that day.

It isn't my fate to kill... It can't be.