6
I awoke with a bad headache, I noticed that my former head was gone. Someone must have come in and cleaned my cell, and washed my body. My hair was cut and my clothes were clean. My body had withered and I had lost much of the muscle I had worked for. So once again, I worked out for some time and then decided to return to the peaceful darkness.
I awoke to the same situation as before. I waited for my headache to go away before I returned. "Simple yet very effective."
I was just about to remove my head when the door opened a crack. My chains still bound me to the wall. Her smell wafted into the room, along with the fresh air. "Who are you and what do you want?" "I'm the one in charge of cleaning up after you." She sounded and smelled afraid. "Re you going to, are you going to tear your head off again?" "And you care why?" "Well it's because, I looked at your record and well. Your list of people you killed and when. Everyone you killed was either on a full moon or when they were trying to capture you. I thin that you're on e of the good ones." "What is the name of this origination?" "We call ourselves the Balance, we capture your kind and put them here so that the human race doesn't all get killed." "We're not stupid, most of us know that if we kill all of you we'd be out of food. Did you come to say that or is there more?" "I need your help." "I'm supposed to help you how?" "I was born into this organization and because of that I can never leave. I'm forced to live underground for my entire life. I need your help to be free." "What am I supposed to do?" "I'll take you to the heart bank." "What the hell is the heart bank?" "When they captured you they took your heart, remember? Any heart they take they put in the heart bank." Her voice was firm, she had been planning this for a long time. OK, but there's a problem. I'm chained to a wall." She pulled out a small can with a tube coming out of the top. She smiled. "What's that?" "Don't worry about that, just to let you know it's been about five hundred years since you become a resident." "What did I miss?" A lot, but so have I, that's why I have to get out of here. I've learned about everything, but I've never experienced any of it. We can learn together." She smiled again. She took out another metal tool, it was shaped like a pair of tongs. She turned a knob on the can and an odd fragrance filled the room. As she scrapped the tongs together they made a weird scratching noise. There was a spark and flames shot out of the can and didn't stop! "You're a witch, you can use magic." "No, this isn't magic, it technology." "Flames from a can, astounding." The then proceeded to cut the chains from the wall. Then she cut the chain next to my wrist, leaving the shackles on my wrists. "Do you know where I can get a lock and key, I want to keep these chains as a memorabilia." "Sure all in good time."
I was free, and my body felt as if gravity had let go its tight grip. I watched her cut the chains that bound my feet. She was beautiful as she worked. Thoughts came to mind but I brushed them away. "Ok, the chains are cut we can go get a lock now." She opened the door, I savored the smell, freedom. She closed the door and locked it. I carried the four pieces of chain over my shoulder. We walked down the long hall. Strange torches hung from the sealing, bugs bussing around them. The hall had doors on both sides, each exactly across from each other and the same distance apart. The chains clinked in rhythm with my steps. "Here we are, this is storage, take anything you think we'll need." I let the chains clatter to the ground as I walked in. The room seemed to have everything. I found a nice large lock and its key. She was standing at the doorway, she was scared, I could smell it. "Do they keep clothing here?" "In the back, you might wanna hurry up." I went into the back, everything was neatly divided up. They had some familiar things and there were some things I had never heard of before. Jeans, t-shirts, sweaters, what could they be? After much debate I took a pair of black jeans with red stitching, the material was weird, it had a rough feel, but they were comfortable. I laced up a pair of large black boots. I tucked the oddly lengthened, t-shirt, into my jeans and put on a black vest. It didn't have any buttons but it did have a weird interlocking system that she called a zipper. I picked up the chains and we continued on.
She stopped at a corner. "There are two guards guarding the heart bank. Don't worry I have a plan." I was so close I had to have them now. "No, wait, get back here!" I ignored her and walked up to the guards. "Hey kid you're not supposed to be in a restricted area." "I'm here to get what's mine." I swung a chain over my head smashing the guards across their faces. I took the chain and wrapped it around one of the guy's neck, tight. He grabbed at the chain, but my decades of training had made me stronger than him. The other guard came from behind, I turned around. I grabbed his face and with a flick of my wrist, I snapped his neck. I heard the girl gasp, I returned to the other guard. The chain was off his neck, but he was struggling to get his breath. O took his dagger and slit his throat, he gurgled like his predecessor. I dropped the remaining three chains with the first on the ground.
I opened the heart bank door. The smell was intoxicating, their was so much power in one room. The girl stood next to me also looking with wonder in her eyes. "You won't want to watch, you'll probably pass out." Oh, ok." She closed the door so it was only open a crack. "These guys make everything so easy." They were ordered from weakest to strongest. Every moment in this room I would savor. First thing first, I had to find my heart. I started in the lower power area. I wasn't that had to find my heart, right underneath it, it had my name. After consuming my heart I went to the end of the isle. I started with the least powerful, it tasted awful. But as I ate more powerful hearts they started to taste better. I could feel my power growing. As I swallowed the last heart the girl opened the door a little bit. I walked out and closed the door before she could look in. I took the ends of the chains. With ease I opened the ends of the rings and made the four pieces into one solid chain. I found the middle of the chain and had it rest on my neck. Then I used the lock to connect the chain at about the end leaving a fourth of the chain. The ends rested at about my knees. Then I took the excess chain and tied each end around my wrists. Instead of actually connecting the chain, I used some string to secure it. Now I wouldn't have to worry when I transformed, but it might not have been enough for around my neck, I'd make sure I had the key ready just in case. "Are you ready to go? I'm done in there." "Ya, I don't have anything to do." She led the way, and we were walking in the noise of my chain. "This is where I need your, expertise. There are seven guards, I need you to get rid of them. Then do what ever you have to, to get the door open." I still had the dead heart bank guard's dagger. I looked around the corner, they all had swords and something that looked like a small musket, I wouldn't know. I charged around the corner, I stabbed the closest guard in the back of his neck. As he crumpled I took his sword. The guards moved toward me, with a swift movement of my arm I lobbed off a guards head. I then brought my blade down the mans shoulder to his groin. But then I had to block the four other guards volleys. I kicked one and he stumbles into his friend's sword. Three were left now, one made a move to my right. I just watched him, even with my eyes focused on him I could hear the other guards move around me. They all pulled out their muskets. The one in front of me inched his finger toward the trigger, which was my sign. I jumped shifting my weight so to land on the ceiling. I leaped down slamming a guard to the wall, breaking his spine. Without laying feet on the ground, I jumped onto the second guard. I grabbed his face, he whimpered and I ripped his head from his shoulders. There was a loud bang as the musket discharged. I looked at him as the blood dribbled down my face. The bullet emerged from my head and fell to the floor. I wiped the blood from my face. I approached him, without adding another bullet to his musket he fired many more times. I came face to face with him. Fear, blood, sweat, and urine perforated the room. He dropped his weapons, my claws extended. I embedded my claws into his chest. I pulled outward trying to tear him in two, but I had not dug deep enough into his chest. Shin ripped, the middle of his rib cage broke. He screamed and stumbled to the floor. I watched as his heart raced visibly in his chest. It slowed, his lungs stopped moving up and down, and the blood stopped pouring out of his open chest. I used the clean part of his shirt to clean the blood off my hands. "A waste of good blood." The girl came out from hiding, it looked like she was going to pass out. Her eyes rolled back and she fell to the ground. "Saw that coming." I picked her up and slung her over my left shoulder. The door was simple, a couple inches thick, steel, and in the center was a perfectly carves sword and shield. The door fell into the street with four good solid kicks. Bright sunlight flooded the hallway, lucky for me the hallway was well lit too. My eyes didn't have to adjust much. Many people were staring at me, but I was in shock of what saw. Buildings towered higher than the largest church I had ever seen. The roads were gigantic solid bricks as well as the areas next to the road. Large metal wagons moved without horses. But I had to keep in mind that it was five hundred years later. I headed south, I wanted to somewhere warm, I hate the cold. I walked and looked at the advancements of humankind. "Hey, hey stop!" Their was a man yelling at me. I stopped and turned to face him. "What are you doing, caring that girl on your shoulder?" "She passed out, I'm taking her home." "Why don't I drive you?" "Nom that's ok." The girl shifted, then opened her eyes. "Where am I?" I put her down, she staggered and leaned against me as she blinked into the bright sun. "Ma'm, what's your name? Do you need any help?" "No I'm fine, oh and my name is Zelene." "Come on Zelene we should get you home before your parents start to worry. Good day sir." We continued walking south, she was studying me. I didn't like it. "Hey that reminds me, what's your name?" "I renounced my name a long time ago." I was an hour later when we came to the sore. The salty air filled my nose, I had never been to the ocean before. "Where are we Zelene?" "Somewhere on the England Coast." "If we go this way we'll get to the English Channel. Is there anywhere you want to go?" "Just one, I want to go to America." "Where's that?" "You know the place Columbus discovered? Well through the course of history that land became one of the strongest countries in the world. They're the strongest, but also the most selfish, but that's beside the point.
Late that night we approached the docks. The boats were oddly shaped and were made of strange material. "Where's the sail?" She laughed, "They have engines, they don't need sails." "What's an engine?" "It makes the boat move without wind or being pulled." She got into one of the boats, she started rummaging around. She opened a small cupboard in front of the seat next to the helm. She pulled out a key, she sat down at the helm. She looked at me and said, "Don't be startled, the noise is the engine." She put the key into a slot, and turned it. It sounded like a large beast roared behind me. I whirled around to face it, "Relax, it the engine, now sit down." She slowly moved a lever on the side, and it started moving forward. When we cleared the docks she pushed on the lever more and it moved faster.