Last One Standing

Chapter 1

No doubt he's fantasizing ways to punish me right now. I briefly consider making a run for it but then remember his tight grip over my wrist.

His lips have curled up in his signature smirk. After often being on the receiving end of this expression, I can't say it phases me anymore. I used to wonder how he did it so perfectly and secretly practiced my own smirk in front of my small bathroom mirror to use against him. But it looked more like a grimace instead. Totally not the type of menacing expression I was going for.

"Aww poor little broke girl is stealing so she can bribe her way into getting first rank" his smirk becomes a mock pout and his light brown eyes scrutinize me. For a second I wonder if I should be worried. But no, Aeryn was never really a threat. Just an insecure boy of average build whose only weapons are his words.

But under the heavy weight of his gaze I feel a little unnerved. I want to step backward to put some space between us but worry it will make me look weak.

"Aww poor little rich brat is worried that I'm copying his own tactics" I step hard on his foot and he grimaces. When his grip on my wrist loosens, I instantly pull away and make a run for it.

He's hot on my trail behind me. I'm a little puzzled as to why he's still pursuing me. Besides his little taunts, he's usually harmless and doesn't waste much time tormenting me. Then I realize I'm still holding his 100 crasos. Oh. I guess I'll return that to him now that I've been caught and all. Can't have him starving to death in the absence of this bill, I think sarcastically. 100 crasos is

probably just loose change for him. It would explain why he had so sloppily stuffed the bill in his pocket, as if he was beyond caring if he lost it. Aeryn only cares now because it's me who took the bill and somehow the idea that I could benefit from his money irritates him. I'm mad at myself though. If only I hadn't been so overconfident, then maybe I could've pulled away from his pocket undetected.

I slow down my pace and come to a halt. I turn on my heels and hold out the crasos. He's behind me but his attention is fixed on a spot over my head. Huh? What is he looking at?

I shove the bill back in Aeryn's hand before turning around. I now know why there was no crowd at the market square. Everybody instead seems to be huddled in the valley below us. Maybe it's nothing, but a sinister feeling envelops me. Why else would everybody be gathered around a single house in the middle of the day?

My feet are already hurrying down the slope and in the direction of the crowd before my mind catches up. For some reason I'm reminded of the way the people in my dirt poor neighborhood crowd around a house after a tragedy. Death from starvation is the most common form.

Even before I push through the crowd, I know what will lie before me. But it's the manner of the tragedy that strips away my breath.

Blood strewn. Torn flesh. Mutilated bodies. I count four heads in total before I decide that the image is too brutal to keep staring at.
I'd seen photos in newspapers. Of faraway places with the names of dead strangers. But somehow the images don't do justice to the horrors of the real version. Maybe it's also worse because of its proximity to home. The dreadful thought that perhaps I know the victims. Someone I've seen around the market maybe. Or someone from school.

The talonraptors were created by the rebel groups in the far off dissenting cities a decade or so ago. Their goal was to create enough of them to raid the executives, a hundred or so people who make all the political decisions for our country, Sophet. The creatures come in the form of a large bird, almost as big as me.
Really, the body is just a robot created in a lab at the rebel camps. The real weapon lies in a deadly poison developed over the years by the rebels. The talonraptor's claws drip with the poison. One swipe on a human body and the poison courses through the mind, beckoning its host to gruesomely kill itself.

But a month after the rebels released the talonraptors into the wild, the executives laid siege on the rebel bases and executed every single rebel.

For many years, while I was a little kid and too young to care, the talonraptors killed off entire villages at a time. But soon the military got the upper hand and the deadly birds were a thing of the past. Until now I guess.

A few weeks ago attacks had resurged and the news took the country in a storm. I had decided at that time that I had enough things to worry about and promptly stopped reading the newspaper. Now I wish I hadn't stopped. Because they're here. In Kratz, the capitol of Sophet and the most heavily protected city of all places!

I turn around and plan to sprint back to my house, anxious to spend another minute away from them. I bump directly into Aeryn, who was apparently standing behind me this entire time. His usual scowl is replaced with a shell shocked expression as he continues to stare at the tangle of blood and bodies below. Coming from the rich part of town and being wealthy himself, he is not accustomed to death.

I leave him there with the rest of the crowd and hurry back home.