Wild thing

(Part 1)

A plane took off from the Brazilian airport with a single crate of cargo on government orders with ten armed guards and two pilots, on July 16th 1993. It returned to the states August 3rd, with four guards and one pilot. The crate was rushed to a laboratory in Northern Wyoming, after thirty minutes of custody the cargo was reported to have escaped. A patrol of twenty man where sent up into mountains to recover the object in question. Three returned. The entire state was put on a lockdown, but no sightings of the creature where reported. When the governor was questioned about this he was clueless as to the reason for the extreme measures taken in apprehending a single animal. The Central Intelligence Agency assured the public that there was no beast on the loose and the lock down was to catch an internet hacker that was suspected to be in the area. Several convoys of troops where spotted moving through out the rocky mountains for several months after ward, nine years after the troops where recalled and the Government had all but given up on finding there lost prize is when we join our young fugitive

Torrent was about fifteen at the time. He'd been on the run his whole life, but it didn't seem to bother him. He was always smiling and laughing, everything was a game to him and it was only getting more fun. His games kept him occupied, hunting, exploring, or studying the various man made constructs that puzzled him so much. The crate he was imprisoned in was one of his favorites. He managed to escape the research center along with the entire metallic box, as well as the bonds they had tried to restrain him with. With all of these strange metallic plates Torrent constructed a crude arm brace extending from his left shoulder to his right knuckles.

This young renegade has a strange ability you see, some would call it a disorder but it was the only thing that kept him alive in the harsh wilderness. Torrent can learn even the most complex things in record time simply by observing them, which is why he became so like the animals around him. None of his former humanity remains, because he never had human contact in his early years of life, instead he absorbed the abilities of the animals around him. His time in the Amazon familiarized him with some of the most lethal predators know to man. Their behavior, their skills, their prey, he studied and learned anything. If he observes anything even for a short time he can evaluate the strengths, flaws, and counter moments needed to take it down. When he was taken to the northern Americas, even more predator's behavior where assimilated in to his way of life. After he became conscious of his ability to learn he became confident, almost cocky. Everything was just another chance to learn a new move; every risk was just another game. So he started to venture closer and closer to civilization.

The one thing he still couldn't figure out was humans, his own race. Their complexities and variations eluded his understanding. So he studied them from afar, he found a near by school with children about his age and watched them from the forest at the edge of its green fields. He watched the stronger ones pick on the weaker ones, the older ones ruling the younger ones, he saw how similar humans where to the rest of the animal kingdom. Slowly he was begun to simulate their upright walking methods. In fact he stared to move around in that technique the majority of time, although he still slouched most of the time. When he did choose to stand at his full height he found himself to be larger then the majority of the children at the school, a good foot or two actually. After several weeks of observing humans he seemed satisfied with his discoveries and was about to move on, then the school exploded.

Purge

(Part 2)

Ann Filler was about fourteen, and was just finishing her Eighth grade in Jr. High. She'd gone through a hard school year, bullies, grades, psychotic teachers, the works, but she had gotten through it. Her year was almost over, but then there would be a long Ninth year and then high school, there was no end it sight. She got good grades, an A average, her family was consistently stressing the point that her life would go to hell if she didn't ace Geography. None the less Ann put up with her life and enjoyed it every once in a while. The rest of the kids where inside gorging them selves on the cheap plastic pizza they made on Saturday and sold on Thursday, Ann was sitting under a tree reading her newest book, "Call of the Wild" by Jack London. Then suddenly her eye caught a slight movement in the tree above her, slowly she looked upward. A small but very fat chipmunk was trying to scale the truck of the tree she was leaning against. It hauled it massive bulk slowly upward until it reached the lowest branch, where it crawled out on the limb and flopped down panting heavily.

She sighed and shook her head as she looked up at the creature only two feet above her head, "Only in America." She thought to herself.

Then the breath caught in her throat, beyond the bloated chipmunk she saw someone perched in a tree at the forest's edge looking at her. He was looking down at her, almost studying her. The boy's eyes where dazzling Amber colored, they stood out from the shadows like a dog's would shine at night. The book fell from her hands as she stood to run. Then she saw him crouch as if getting ready to pounce. The Bell sounded and Ann glanced quickly back at the school, when her head snapped back to the boy, and he was gone. The branch he had been squatting and still swung slightly, but the young teenager who had sat there was no where to be seen. An English teacher called for to 'hurry the hell up or get a god dame detention', so Ann bent over and grabbed her book and jogged quickly back through the doors of her school.

Math was Ann's worst subject; normally she would spend the entire period furiously scribbling notes, but today she continuously found her self staring out the window to the forest at the end of the school grounds. The teacher, Mr. Fiddly, had to call her name out several times to grasp her attention. Every time though her eyes would slowly drift toward the line of the trees lining the horizon, and her mind wandered.

"He looked about my age, maybe a little older. His clothes where torn and dirty, maybe he was some homeless kid. Maybe he lived nearby but his family was poor. Maybe he was an Alien, who cares!" Her mind kept trying to find reasons to block the image of the boy from her memory, but none the less she kept staring at those trees waving in the wind. The bell rang and made her mind snap back to reality, and she began to furiously packing up her books when the teacher called her name,

"Mrs. Filler, would you speak with me please." He had one of those, I'm trying not to snap, tones in his voice. Ann smiled nervously and slowly walked up to his desk. The second she sat down next to him, Fiddly asker a question,

"Do you know you current grade in my class, Ann?" He was smiling slightly which made her uncomfortable.

"Um, a C?" she wanted to leave but the door was blocked by his desk

"A D, Mrs. Filler." He was still smiling

"Oh." She had know for a while, now.

"So what are your plans?" his teeth where slightly yellow from smoking.

"Ah, try harder?" She would say anything just to get the hell out of there.

"Are you willing to do the work?" Razing one eyebrow as he leaned forward, she shrank back into her seat. The last of the other students left the class room.

"Um, yes." He laughed slightly and put his hand on her knee.

"No, no, my child, I meant what are you willing to do, to pass?" The hand slid up her leg, and then it happened. Ann gripped the side of her head and screamed.

Pain shot through her head momentarily then there was a loud cracking sound and Mr. Fiddly exploded, but it didn't stop there. His desk burst into splinters, the door was reduced to toothpicks, the bricks set in the wall where ripped apart. A blinding white light flashed and everything within sixty feet from where Ann was sitting was reduced to rubble. The migraine faded and Ann opened her eyes, her school lay in pieces. For a few seconds there was silence then every one started shrieking. Children and teachers alike ran screaming, one of the teachers pointed at Ann and cried,

"She's got a bomb!" This accusation only caused more frantic screams and more people to flee away from the wreckage.

Ann heard muffled sirens approaching in the distance, they where coming for her. She started to breathe heavily, her veins pumped adrenalin, and her heart began to beat furiously. She panicked, and ran. The walls of the school where no longer intact so she ran directly to the line of trees, she had no where else to go, but just before she disappeared into the thick underbrush she heard the sirens pull up to the school and stop. Branches grabbed at her face and tore at her skin as she stumbled through the pine trees and aspen groves. She couldn't yet hear the police but she knew they where coming, and that she couldn't out run them. That explosion had really taken it out of her, she was surprised that she had the energy to move. The adrenalin was running thin in her blood and her muscle ached, soon she could hear police crashing through the woods behind her. They where running hard, they where so close she could hear the crackle of radio chatter echoing through the trees. Tears poured down her face, her mussels screamed and her Migraine was returning. Ann slowed to a stop and fell to her knees next to a large rock. She could feel the pulses in her head as her brain wailed with pain, what ever happened back there wasn't natural, and her body was rejecting it. The world suddenly felt distant as her vision got fuzzy, Ann felt like she was looking though out at her life from a room in the back of her head. Then she saw those amber eyes again looking down at her again.

Six Police burst through the foliage to find the girl they where chasing waiting for them. Each officer was wearing fully plated body armor and carried fully automatic machine guns. They wore gas masks and full packs. A little excessive for running down a single young suspected girl. One of the men stepped off to the side and radioed in that 'the girl was in custody and they where on their way back'. The other five troops circled around the Fourteen year old child and talked to one another.
"Well, we finally got her."

"Yea, took long enough. Just think of how many tax dollars where spent in tracking little 'miss explode stuff' cost us."

"What really blows my mind is that she was right here the whole time!"

"Yea, a hundred divisions in a hundred other countries to find one like this and she ends up being right under our noises." The radio officer walked over and joined the group, after a few moments silence he scratched his head and asked,
"Hey what's she looking at?" All six men turned in unison and looked up in the trees above them. Before they even had a chance to raise there guns Torrent hit the first one. He lunged from the branch he'd been observing on and close lined the radio guy with his elbow. The glass covering his eyes shattered and the mask covering his mouth was driven in and broke the man's nose. Before he could finish screaming, Torrent whirled around and swept the legs out from two others, their guns sprayed up in to the air as they fell. They hit the ground hard and Torrent grasped the ankles and flung them against the large rock, small pebbles broke off when the two slammed fiercely against the boulder. Realizing they where under attack two of the officers charged Torrent, he grabbed the two by the head and cracked their skulls together. They crumpled to the ground, and then he turned to the last one. The officer brought up his gun and took aim. Torrent slapped the gun aside and in three quick moves broke the guys arm in six places. He gun fell from his hand as he screamed, but before it could hit the ground Torrent whirled around and brought his heal hard against the side of the mans temple, his screams where cut short and he crumpled to the ground. Ann wasn't sure if Torrent had killed him or if the officer would spend the rest of his life as a vegetable, nether would have surprised her.

After looking around at his collection of victims, Torrent turned to Ann. She saw he was smiling, very broadly. He looked kind of crazy, with his hair all messy and his eyes wide with glee, but for some reason Ann wasn't scarred. The police had scarred the hell out of her but Torrent for some reason had no effect over her. Even when he started walking toward her she didn't shrink away or feel at all in danger. Torrent bent down and pulled a small dart from out of her neck. Her head began to clear and her vision returned to normal, what ever drug was in that dart it was wearing off. He sniffed the dart briefly then tossed it over his shoulder, and then he put out his hand to help Ann up. His hand had small claws at the tip of each finger. His entire body was pretty dirty but he smelled as if he had taken a bath earlier that day. His shirt was torn in numerous places and his pants where faded and tattered. The strange contraption covering his right arm was surprisingly well polished however, the leather straps fastening it into place where well kept too. Then she realized she was staring, she giggled slightly then took his hand.