Escape

Chapter 1

                “Churnov!” We all exclaimed in surprise. I couldn’t believe what was happening. Shax had found our secret base that was to protect us all, but Churnov turned us in to Shax so Churnov could spare his own damned life.

            “W-Why did you do this to us?” Alex said through gritted teeth. “We were your friends. “You betrayed us.”

            “Ha!” Churnov laughed easily amused. “I was never your friend Alex, even after what happened at Fort Rack 2 years ago.”

            “But the Fort group and I saved your life!” Alex shouted in a mix of sorrow and anger.

            “You did, but what good would have that done if I didn’t decided to turn you boys in now? It meant I would be dead being a soldier. Just think of it this way Alex, now that I turned you boys in, it wasn’t a waste of time for you fellas to help me at Fort Rack.” Churnov snarled.

            “Did Shax brainwash you? How can have you become so evil in one day?” Alex asked.

            “I did not do any of my worldly magic’s on Churnov. He chose his path and decided to be on my side. It’s as simple as that.” Shax said calmly. Then he smiled evilly. “And now it’s time for the slaughter show to get on.” Shax barked out two strange words that must have been some kind of monster language then two skeleton knights appeared at the door way.

            “Roil and Furn, you can do whatever you want with this man over here.” Shax said. Then he pointed to Churnov.

            “Wh-What?!” Churnov roared. “But we made a deal! You said you would let me live if I showed you the secret base!” Churnov cried.

            “I did, but I lied. Now off with you.” Shax snarled evilly. Churnov began to scream as two of the skeleton knights started to drag him away. One of the skeletons was laughing. It was creepy. Its fragile jaw fell up and down very quickly. And a deep croaky dry laugh came out. It was almost as bad as scratching the chalk board with your finger nails. No, worse.

            “What are you going to do with us?” Natalia moaned. She looked to Shax willing him to give an answer that doesn’t involve with out deaths.

            “I have two options for you darling.” Shax snickered. “You group with the special abilities can come with me and go do my every bidding…” He paused and smiled.

            “What’s the other option?” Alex asked slowly.

            “The other option is that you can also have a very slow and painful death. What’s your choice eh?” Shax laughed.

            Both choices sounded bad. But to tell the truth, I wanted to work for Shax more then die a slow and painful death. But if I worked for Shax my life would be miserable. I would have to be exactly like a slave. And he probably would want us to do his dirty work for him. Example, kill his enemies. I never want to be guilty of murder. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself knowing that I killed someone.

            I didn’t know what to choose. Either I become a slave for a monster, or die a very painful and slow death. They both sucked real bad. I wanted to cry but that would resolve nothing except for maybe sympathy from the other people.

            Alex, Drew, Natalia, Jessica, nor Chad answered yet. I didn’t want to be the first one to answer. But finally a voice spoke up. Chads.

            “I have reached a decision.” Chad said to Shax.

            “Really you have? Now I hope you’ve been smart about this boy.” Shax purred.

            “I am being smart.” Chad said guiltily. Alex and I exchanged nervous glances.

            “So what is it? Don’t keep me waiting. I’m a busy man.” Wow, he just called himself a man. In fact he’s the exact opposite.

            “I- I have decided to take paths with you.” Chad said.

            “WHAT?!” Alex blurted out in anger and confusion. “B-But he’s on the evil side Chad! Why would you go with him?!”

            “Because!” Chad said raising his voice in annoyance. “He offered us two choices man! To live or die! And he even said he would make our deaths painful! What other option do I have?!” Chad snapped.

            Alex didn’t know how to reply to that. He just looked to the floor and took sudden interest in the gravel we were standing on.

            “My, my, I always love these dramatic moments. You have chosen the right path young man.” Shax smiled. His smile looked so meaningful that I could have even mistaken him as a kindly old man.

            “So will the rest of you come as well or will you meet a sadistic fate?” Shax asked.

            “I would rather DIE than come with you!” Drew snarled, still remembering how coldly Shax killed his mother.

            “Oh really? Are you sure?” Shax snickered as he began to walk towards Drew. Drew took a step back but held firm. If I were him I would get up, scream, and run like crazy. I wanted to shout out, ‘DREW, RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!’ But my mouth was glued shut with magic glue.

            “Y-You don’t scare me.” Drew said boldly but his voice cracked at the end of ‘me’.

            “Yes, I do. I can read your body and mind. Your fear of me is strong. So strong.” Shax said as he looked down upon Drew as Shax is 1 foot taller. While Shax and Drew did a stare down, I walked behind Alex and whispered into his ear,

            “What do we do?”

            “I don’t know.” Was his simple, honest, but disappointing reply.

            “Can’t you make another portal or something?” I asked quietly.

            “No, it takes too long; he would get me before I even get to Phase 2.” He said.

            “Phase 2?” I asked.

            “Doesn’t matter, all I know is that I can’t do it.” He said. I looked away from him and looked around the room looking for a possible idea of an escape. I then looked around at all the other people crowding around. I had an idea. I turned my direction toward the exit and whispered to Alex, Jessica, and Natalia, to get ready. I took a deep breath and prepared my plan to get into action. 1, 2, 3, aaaaand,

            “Jason, if you even think about screaming out loud the word ‘run’ again and starting another rampage, the next time I meet you, I won’t even give you two options. I will give you the only option of a slow death.” Shax said without even looking up from Drew. Whoa! Could he read minds? Because that was exactly my plan. Crap. Ok, I’m out of ideas. But that wasn’t necessary because right at that moment, came our savior.  

            There was a loud boom off to the right of us. Everyone looked to the right, including Shax. Which is his left, but whatever, you know what I mean. Coming out of the dust was a tall man with moderate muscular arms. Not like Arnold or something but strong enough to break a bone. He was holding two strange guns. And he was pointing them to Shax.

            Shax snarled at the man and in a blink of an eye, Shax disappeared. But along with Chad…

 A few of us cheered and we looked to the man who saved us. But the strangest thing was, he was gone. Just like that. In the blink of an eye. Gone.

            “Who was that?” I asked when I had enough guts to ask.

            “That was Daemon. He is a Sorvius trainer.” Alex said. There it was again. The word Sorvius. What’s a Sorvius?

            “In case you’re wondering, a Sorvius is a special ability like all six of us have. Every century the powers are usually sent from the owner to someone new. There were originally 57 powers but most of the owners died along with them. And so Daemon teaches us about using our powers.” Alex said.

            I nodded and looked around. People began to relax, one man checked outside to find the battle still raging on. The big gaping hole in the wall meant one thing: The monsters can see through it. We all decided it wasn’t just safe to hang around and wait until a monster found us so everyone decided to get far away as possible from this city. People slowly began to panic once more.

            “Come on. Let’s go.” Drew said to us.

            “Yeah, let’s go.” Alex said. Then he began to lead us out of the wall and we led the other hundreds of people. I really didn’t want to be in the front. I wanted to be in the middle. So if something came up front, it would attack the people at the front first. Or if it came from behind it would grab the person behind first. And they can also grab at people from the sides, but I decided not to complain after how we cheated death a second ago.

            We walked clear out of the monsters way for a few miles or so until we got caught.

            “Hey! Looks like fresh meat!” One monster said to his buddy. It chilled me, I never saw a Zenrez talk before. And I don’t really think that Shax is a Zenrez. Now that I thought of it, what was he? A general of the Zenrez? He couldn’t be the king. It would be too risky for him to keep making random appearances. But that didn’t matter now; I might be slaughtered messily in about a minute.

            “Where you folks going? Leaving? Now? But the funs just started!” One of the creatures cackled. I knew where this was going.

            “You better leave them alone if you know what’s best for you.” Said a voice not so far off. Everyone (And I mean everyone) all turned their head to the direction where the voice came. It was the man again. What was his name? Oh yes, Daemon.

            “Screw off if you know what’s best for YOU.” The creature snarled. Daemon stared at the beast for a few seconds, shrugged, and then he did something very unexpected. He blew lightning out of his mouth! I’m pretty sure that’s impossible but it isn’t no more. But after all I have seen, NOTHING can be impossible.

            The lightning got on target. The blast from the strike was so devastating that a few sparks flew towards us and stung us a little. Just minor damage though. The demon screamed in pain but only for a split second as it was blown to pieces. It was (how should I explain it?) DISGUSTING. The blood and guts went EVERYWHERE. It splattered all over me. I would have screamed if Jessica wasn’t here.

            The other demon stared in shock at his little ‘buddy’ on the floor. Well actually he stared at the pieces of his buddy, and they were everywhere. The demon blinked once, twice, then got it together and did the smart thing. He ran. I thought Daemon was going to go after him and kill him but he didn’t. I guess he was just proving his point. As shock ended everyone began to grin then laugh then cheer.

            “Daemon! Daemon! Daemon!” Everyone shouted happily as they punched their fists up in the air giving him praise. Daemon didn’t even smile though. He just began to walk slowly p to the front of the crowd very stiffly.

            “Everyone! I was sent by the king Troforus to protect you all. A messenger named Jarrod told the king of your situation in the small cave. So I came here on behalf of the king. And my love to this city.” Daemon said firmly. “I can’t guarantee all of your safety so you must follow my orders.” He paused, coughed, spat out some mucus, cleared his throat, pounded his chest, and continued to talk. “First of all, I want none of you to go in front of me or too far from me. You all need to keep up. Second, I want none of you to go wandering around or challenging a demon. Finally, don’t make loud noises and try to be sneaky as possible. Oh, and when we are attacked please do not try to help me fight the Zenrez. You will confuse me, I will die, you will die, and everyone else will die. Now we must go onward be quick and don’t stop for air or water.” Daemon said.

Then he began to run. A few of us stood there for a few seconds but then are senses kicked in and we ran after him.

I have to admit, it wasn’t easy catching up with Daemon. He ran fast and seemed to never get tired. Maybe he was tired but he didn’t want to show it. Or maybe it was his adrenaline. Whatever. It didn’t help that I’m not fit. I’m skinny as a stick. My best time on my mile run at school was 10:35 seconds. Yeah, real good right?

“W-Wait! Can you hold up please?” I asked out of breath. Right when I said that a bunch of other people began to agree with me saying the same. I guess they were all waiting for the first person to break out. Daemon sighed apparently annoyed.

“I told you all! ALL of you! We can’t stop for anything! I’m sorry but we are in a life or death situation! We must continue!” Daemon said, and then he started to run again. A few people moaned but we kept running.

 

We ran for a LONG time. And I mean a lonnng time. We ran straight for 30 minutes or more. I almost staggered and fell, but I tried my best to keep it together for the others and so I wouldn’t look like a total wimp in front of Jessica. That’s when it hit me. Where the hell is Jessica? I began to panic because now that I think of it, I haven’t seen her for more then 10 minutes. I can’t believe I just realized! I’m such a dope! I didn’t know what to do but then I decided to tell Daemon.

“Daemon! Daemon! Stop, Stop!” I shouted. Daemon actually did stop and turned around to look at me. Everyone else immediately stopped and they all sighed in relief.

“What is it you want child?” Daemon asked. He seemed quite annoyed that I stopped him from running. Maybe he enjoyed it.

“I think we left someone behind at one point!” I said through ragged breaths. I was tired as well.

“So? What do you expect me to do? Go look for her?” He asked angrily.

“Well yes but-” I started to say.

“But what? So I can waste precious time by back tracking looking for someone that’s probably already dead by now and if not, would be wasteful to start looking for. Its only one person! Like I said, I can’t guarantee all your safety. And if I left this group behind, chances are is that a Zenrez will attack the group and they will have no protection. So would you rather make me look for someone that’s already likely dead and make all these other people die or continue onward while we still have a chance? The war has barely begun you know. If we go back then will be madness trying to get back here.” Daemon said. I didn’t like how he was implying that Jessica was dead.

“You said you were supposed to protect us! Some guardian angel you are!” I snarled. A little fire burned in Daemons eyes and then he began to stomp towards me. I winced. He looked down at me and began to talk through clenched teeth.     

“I’m doing as best as I can. I cannot do a 100% effort job, but if you’re so worried about this person why don’t you go after him/her yourself. If we re lucky maybe you will die so you cannot annoy and stall us anymore.” All of a sudden I wasn’t grateful for Daemon saving us. Saving us was just his compelled duty. I bet he had no real heart.

“Humph. Maybe I will. What if I really do die? How would you live with the fact that you let one of the people you were supposed to protect just slip out of your hands so easily? I do not think the king will be pleased.” I said boldly. For a few seconds I thought he was going to slap me but he didn’t.

After a few seconds of awkward silence and stare off, Daemon snarled at me and walked back to the front of the group. He began to lead us again without saving another word.

I bet he was joking about making me leave to find Jessica. But I will tell you one thing-

I wasn’t. I began to walk slowly away from the crowd and I hid in the shadows to look for the missing Jessica Jewels. If Daemons right, I might be on a wild goose chase that could lead me to my doom. 

Author's Note

Force
Chapter 1: Escape