Daring Saviors

Raz:

    “Where is your brother?” I ask, slightly irritated as I watch the cars stream by in orderly lines just in front of the museum parking lot.

    “I don’t know.The whole car probably got lost because he had the GPS.” A tall girl with black and red hair replies, shading her blood red eyes from the blazing sun as she scans the bustling streets for the familiar old blue pick up truck.

“Anyone got a phone? We could call them.” Dang, Mr. Bobby looks frustrated. His mouth is plastered in a straight line and his face is slightly red, not to mention the slight twitch to his left eye. No wonder, Nyx’s brother, Alec, and about 4 other chaperones are half an hour late for the museum tour. And, of course, Alec doesn’t answer his phone. Figures right?

“Hey, Raz!” My head snaps up, awakened from my thoughts, as I search for the owner of the previous voice, Brittney. Brittney’s nickname, Blitz, seems to fit her more and more each day, I realize, as I watch her bounce around me before jumping over to dash around Nyx. Nyx, though busy looking for her brother, spared a smile for the shorter girl. I can't help but shake my head at the ground and smile. I’ve known her the longest out of my little group of friends, and we have grown closer over the years.

“Do you wanna give me a piggyback ride?” I look back up into the wide, chocolate brown eyes I had learned to know so well.

“Of course.” I stride over with her to a bench, which she jumps on eagerly, skinny arms already outstretched to hug my neck.

“Hang on Blitz, let me put my backpack down.” I vocalize before she can jump on me. I hear her huff in igdantion, and I can't help but let out a little laugh. Blitz’s waist long black hair was waving gently in the breeze when I turn back to look at her, and any boy would be falling over themselves to hook up with her, but she was always the curious silent type. I’ve even seen her scare off one of those jockeys with just a glance.

I feel her arms loop my neck, and I set my arms up to catch her legs. She had barely just jumped on my back when we hear a whining noise, like a dysfunctional loudspeaker being aired all over the museum parking lot.

“What was that?” Starlyn cried out, looking around wildly. Her blue-grey eyes dashed with a small amount of terror. The whining noise was just loud enough to be concerning.

Oh no not this!

A tall girl wearing an overly large black sweatshirt with a white tribal skull design and jeans that just barely covered her black lace up high-tops, shifted her bright red headphones off her snowy white head. Her bright green eyes were gazing up at the sky, I wondered for a moment what she was looking at, but that thought quickly escaped my mind when I heard another whining noise and the girl I knew as the solitary new girl, Alani, was screaming for everyone to run, waving her arms like a military corporal screaming ‘charge’.

Please!!

    “GET A MOVE ON!! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!! DROP EVERYTHING AND JUST RUN!” Well, I was frozen to the spot for a moment, still trying to understand why the silent and violent girl that never talked decided it was a good time to be screaming like the insane. Thats when the second whining stopped. It was then that I realized what the whining was. I started flat out sprinting as fast as my legs could carry me with Blitz barely holding on to my back. I may be 15, but I could still run faster than a lot of people. I risked a quick glance behind me, I was closest to the parking lot exit, and I turned to see everyone running for their lives. Which was good, because if they weren’t running they were about to-

NO!! Come ON!!

    BOOOM!

    The ground shook. I could hear metal tearing itself apart, wood crashing, tapestries ripping, the smoke was filling my eyes so I couldn’t see, it was in my throat and I couldn’t breath. My lungs were screaming for oxygen. I fell to the ground and-

    I finally woke up, shivering and in a cold sweat. I pulled myself out of that awful nightmare. I realised that I was clutching my scar from that awful day. Gasping for air, just like I was then. My scar was throbbing, The whole thing, from the bottom of my right cheek bone to under my gold green eye, then curling through my eyebrow into my hairline.

A piece from the explosion ripped my face open when I fell to the ground. Blitz was still on my back when I fell, so I had maneuvered her small frame under my broad one to protect her. I have very broad shoulders. She was horrified when she looked up at me when the smoke had cleared. She couldn’t stand the sight of blood then. There was blood everywhere, the cut in my face was at least an inch thick. It cut through my cheek and scraped the bone all the way across my face.  

That was one year ago, lucky us, we were in the first bombing of the Diarmuid war.  The chaperone car was just in time to have student’s guts smeared all over the windshield. And we have been in a few other bombings since then too. We’ve been prepared for those, now knowing of the full on war.  

I looked around me to see where I ended up falling asleep the night before. I sleep like a rock, but only for a few hours. I had found myself a nice little pile of snow to sleep on, though it was in a dirty back alley. I stood up and brushed the snow from my jeans as I started to remember what we had last night. I slid my sheath over my head, drawing out the longsword to clean it with the available snow.  My longsword is  4 feet long, its silver black blade stained with some werewolf blood. The green batting tape-wrapped hilt is about a foot long.  If I stand it up, It’s as tall as me. Because I’m only like 5’4, but I don’t remember the last time I checked.

Nyx and I had decided to go out and practice a bit with our least favorite weapons. So she took my weapon and I took hers. Nyx is strong, but her small build can’t wield my heavy longsword very well. And I just don’t like her slim katanas. Of course in our moment of weakness, some newly changed werewolves, that still weren't in control of the change, decided to attack. We were stuck with our undesirable weapons, but we’re good fighters, and managed to keep our heads on our necks.

I rubbed my sword on the hem of my orange zip up hoodie and tucked it over my shoulder into my black sheath. I pulled my five daggers and two throwing knives out of the snow bank, one dagger in each black canvas boot, tied in with the purple laces. One dagger and throwing knife on each hip and the last one at the ready in my hand. Finally, I grab my old grey and black messenger bag, and sling that over my shoulder too. My bag is light, which isn’t a good thing. I keep my food and a few extra weapons in it. I must be running low on food. I’ll deal with that later though. I started to walk to what has become my sanctuary over the past couple of months.

All of the others have a home to go back to each night. I prefer the streets, because that’s where I was raised. Both my parents passed  when I was young so I don’t remember them. I think of them as I pull my mid-back length of super curly hair into a tight bun. The neon green streak turning into a spiral surrounded by a deep brown. The bottom half of my head gets chilled since the hair is shaved, making me look even more intimidating. I grew up tough and hard on the streets, and somehow I found my way into school. I was probably the only kindergartener who could throw a knife and hit the target. Nevermind that, I was probably the only one to have touched a real metal knife before. I was learning the longsword by the time I hit six. Skills like that come in handy.