DarkWing (Final Editing in Progress)

Chapter 9 - DarkWing

The cool wind blowing through the crisp, crimson tree leave, it made enough sound for me to adjust my footing without being noticed. At night, everyone was paranoid, everyone was cautious. It was not uncommon for someone to be mugged, or worse. To be fair, they had a good reason to be paranoid, I mean hell, I was sitting in a tree waiting for an opportunity to steal. But it made the job that much harder.

It was my first night out. I was perched in a large tree about a block away from Shadow, but I could see her clearly. It must've been around 1 in the morning. The moon was hanging high in the sky and was the only relief the humans' had from the thick darkness. The street lights were broken, all windows were closed, it was quiet. I used to feel so much sympathy for them, for the families in those houses, poor and living in constant fear. But after this night, it all changed.

We did it to survive. We never hurt anyone. We may have stolen from closed stores, searched garbage heaps, salvaged anything we could find, but never hurt anyone. I was watching Shadow. She tucked her wings in and slipped on a black leather jacket over her white tank top and zipped it up and had on torn up black jeans. She moved as fluently and silently as the invasive darkness that hid us from the humans' judgemental eyes.

There were a few others on the street, walking in their respective directions with their heads down. I watched as Shadow made her way towards a closed pawn shop. She told me that those tend to be the best places to go to since they have such a variety of things, and so many items that the shop owners can hardly keep track of it all. She was a few buildings down from the shop when a man accidentally bumped into her. She kept walking, but he turned around. "Watch where you're going!" he said. Shadow kept on walking, but then he yelled: "Hey! I'm talking to you!" Shadow began to walk faster.

"Rule number one." I remembered Shadow explaining to me the basic things I would need to know to survive out in the world like this. "Avoid conflict and never ever bring attention to yourself. You want people to notice you no more than they would a crack in the sidewalk." She wasn't doing a very good job at showing me "how it's done."

"Hey!" the guy yelled. Some lights in the houses began to peek through the closed windows as he ran towards Shadow. He grabbed her shoulder but felt her wing hidden under her shirt. "What the..."

From a block away, I could see his eyes widen. His heart began racing and he jumped back away from her. "She's one of them!" he yelled. "She's one of those freaks!"

All of the people on the street that were just going their separate ways were now all staring at Shadow. People's windows and front doors began to open. They all stared at her, their faces that were filled with fear were now warping with hate.

"What is going on?" I thought to myself as I saw people start walking out of their houses with bats, metal pipes, anything they could find. People on the street were picking up broken tree limbs, empty glass bottles, anything they could find. I could see on Shadow's face that she was scared. She began backing up away from the approaching crowd. Her back was against a closed tv shop window. She was surrounded, had nowhere to go.

"Get out of there..." I whispered. They were getting closer and closer, and she desperately spread her wings. They ripped through her jacket leaving 2 perfect slits. She began to fly upwards but a man quickly grabbed her leg, swung her into the ground where she landed on her hands and knees, and broke one of her wings with a metal pipe. She screamed, and before I knew it, I was standing over that man's unconscious body.

I moved faster than even my own mind could follow. I dashed out of that tree, landed between the man and Shadow, swept him off his feet and slammed his head into the ground. The other's were startled and backed up, but one came out of the crowd with a gun aimed straight at me. He angrily approached me screaming at me, and I stood completely still staring back at him.