I took in a deep breath of chilling air that almost seemed to piece my lungs and sent me coughing straight away. I stood up in my fit of coughing only to see black spots cloud my vision and I had to grip the wall behind me for support. The first thing I was aware of was how cold it was and how it shouldn't be this cold inside a house, they reality hit me. Looking around I could see that everything was in tatters. The weapon bags were gone from the corner of the room. There were wood splinters all across the floor, glass shattered across it, the sofas were all torn up ... and then the bodies.
Everything came flooding back and I had to grip the wall harder for support but that one second of stabilization was all I needed. I raced across the room to where Jade was laying and looked for signs of breathing. She was thankfully, I then slapped her lightly on the face but she wouldn't wake up any time soon. She was fine.
I was about to check everyone else when I heard the most stomach churning noise I had heard in all of my life. The sound of coughing and spluttering up blood. I whirled around to see a crumpled body in the corner next to the stairs.
"Jamie!" I whispered as I stumbled across the cluttered floor to get to him not caring what I stood on.
There was a small pool of blood around his head. I was instantly taking off my shirt and pressing it against his head to stop the bleeding. What was the first aid for this situation? I couldn't even remember what there was to do for head wound. Should I sit him up? What if he had a concussion? Would sitting him up effect that? If I sat him up there was a higher risk of haemorrhage. So I had to leave him laying down but coughing up blood, that was bad. If I left him on his back he would definitely choke to death. I rolled him onto his side very carefully and kept the pressure on his head.
"Hey," I said slapping his face lightly. "Hey Jamie, can you hear me?" I asked him. "Jamie?" I asked.
Suddenly I realised I hadn't even checked to see if he was breathing! I had heard him cough up blood but what I that had been him choking to death on it and I was too late? I looked down at him, unable to see if he was breathing by looking at his stomach. I leant my ear down to his nose and felt the slightest little bit of air come out of his nose. Fear pulsed through me. He was going to die!
"Alex!" I shouted, I was crying now. "Alex! Get up you lazy moron!" I shouted.
Everyone was across the room and I couldn't reach them from here. What if Alex was dead or dying too? With my free hand I tucked some lose strands of hair behind my ear to clear my vision before feeling for a pulse on Jamie. I felt the smallest pulse I had ever felt run past my fingers.
"Don't you dare die on me Jamie!" I sobbed. "Don't you dare!" I screamed for Alex again.
Suddenly Jamie's unconscious body lurched to the side and retched up a stinking pile of vomit before falling unconscious again. Not good.
"Alex," I whispered into the silence all around me and a tear fell from my eye.
Jamie was dying and I couldn't save him.
Suddenly his eyes seemed to flicker open and hold open very slightly.
"Hey," he said in such a way that it was barely a whisper.
"Hey," I smiled back through my tears.
His face was blank with emotion but I could tell he was studding me.
"Is- ..." he wheezed. "Is everyone okay?"
I nodded wiping some more tears away only to find that they were quickly replaced.
"They'll all be okay," I said choking back a loud sob.
"And I'll be okay too," he muttered so quietly I could barely hear him and I could tell he knew he wouldn't. "You remember when we were kids and we played those games where we'd build forts and then John would come and tell us off?"
"Yeah," I answered forcing a smile onto my face through the tears.
"Funny thing is, I can't even remember what any of those forts looked like," he smiled wheezing slightly. "Will you do something for me?" he asked.
"Anything," I answered nodding furiously.
"I need you to tell Bree..." he stopped wheezing for air and I could have sworn I heard water gurgling in his throat as he breathed. "Tell her that, I always ... thought she was ... very pretty," he said now gripping my hand with his so tightly that I thought a bone might shatter but I gripped it right back, refusing to let him go.
"Yes, yes, of course I will. I will, Jamie. I will," I reassured him as more tears fell.
"Shh," he whispered. "I don't want any tears, after all I'll probably see you soon," he laughed wheezing as he did. I had to smile, I didn't want to but I had to. I had to smile at his last joke even if I didn't find it funny I had to do it for him.
Jamie went limp at that moment.
"Jamie?" I questioned not able to keep my voice from wavering. "Jamie? Jamie!" I screamed at his limp body. "No, no, no, no, NO!" I cried. "Jamie! JAMIE!" tears poured from my eyes and down my cheeks. " I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," I whispered, every part of my whole being was trembling. "So sorry," I whispered to him.
I curled myself up in the corner of the room and looked around at the mess that had been created. The werewolves were the cause of this. This was their fault. It was their fault that Jamie was dead. This was their fault.
I looked around the room and suddenly realised something about my promise. Bree wasn't here. I was immediately searching through the rubble for a gun but I failed to find any. They must ahve taken all of them! I could imagine their smug little faces, leaving Jamie for dead, knowing that we couldn't do anything to save them as they dragged Bree away. I then began searching for my bow and an arrow to go after those stupid creatures when a hand appeared on my shoulder. Alex's concerned face looked down at me with those stupid curls on his head.
"Let me go, I'll find her," he said quietly.
"I'll come with you," I countered wiping a tear from my face.
"No, you'll stay here. They'll need someone when they wake up," he said nodding his head towards Jade and Nathan.
I clenched my jaw in annoyance but I knew that he was right. I nodded and I suddenly found my face being gripped by his hand so that I was looking directly at him.
"You're boss now. Do everything in your power to get those two out together, at least they have a chance at a normal life with a family," he muttered.
I wasn't offended by what he said as I knew he was right. Those two loved each other, they already had the startings of a normal love life if I could get them out of here. If I could get them out.
"Just try and get back here alive," I said quietly knowing I would probably never, ever see him again.
***
When Jade and Nathan eventually came around, they were both distraught about Jamie and Bree and then worried about Alex. I sat on one of the torn up couches, hugging my knees, unable to think about anything other than Jamie, Alex and Bree. A tear found its way down my face which I wiped off immediately. The silence terrified me although I could also see it as positive. It meant that I hadn't heard Alex screaming for his life ... yet.
I found myself skimming through old memories of all of us in my head, when we laughed at every moment. When we had pranked somebody at base really well, when we'd had to run away from an adult down a quiet hallway, when we all just sat playing cards for the fun of it, not because otherwise our minds would drift onwards to our deaths.
I physically had to rock myself back and forth just to try and stay sane. I was so overwhelmed that I felt sick and was sure I would vomit at any moment but I never did.
I couldn't fall asleep like Jade and Nathan did after a couple of hours, curled up together, I couldn't. It was clear that they were in a relationship now and as happy as I was for them, it used to be that Jade and I were 'the girls' and stuck together like glue whilst all the guys stuck together as well but now it seemed that I was alone and so was Alex.
It was as I was watching them that I heard the most distant cry and that was it, I was out of the door without saying goodbye to my two friends, and running through the woods, only stopping when I had eventually run out of breath.
It was beginning to get light now and I could see the little innocent dew drops on the blades of grass below my feet, as though they were completely unaware of what had happened.
I gripped my bow so tightly with it already loaded that my fingers were already numb. I looked at every single bush and every shadow making sure that I didn’t miss anything that looked even just remotely like a wolf.
I hoped for Jade and Nathan's sake I came back. Alex hadn't which put me in charge but the last thing they needed was to be left just them in a forest full of werewolves. All I needed to do was find food, shoot it and get back to the cottage without being eaten alive by the wolves.
I tried to distract myself from what I was doing. I was walking out into certain death in an attempt to try and feed Jade and Nathan. Think about something else Kayla! I mentally screamed at myself. Quotes. I used to love studding quotes. What good ones could I think of right now?
You will find that it is necessary to let things go; simply for the reason that they are heavy. So let them go, let them go. I tie no weights to my ankles.
I began to relax slightly in my shoulders but not in my head.
Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
I stepped off the path and began to walk silently onto the grass where nobody had walked.
Experience is not what happens to you; it’s what you do with what happens to you.
I began scanning more and more carefully and looking for the wolves in places where they were likely to jump out of and where they weren’t because in the past they sometimes they had jumped out of unlikely places.
Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom vanishes. You are free.
I kept walking, still wary but less afraid. Eventually I was out of sight of the cottage but I kept walking. I watched everything so carefully.
I walked for roughly half an hour, not seeing anything and getting more and more worried as I went. I needed to think of another quote. Say one if you can’t think of one.
Courage-
Suddenly I was knocked off my feet and pushed up against something rough, a tree, with a knife against my throat, my bow pulled out of my hand and flung somewhere. The bark scraped painfully against my back causing me to wince. My eyes focused on a boy in front of me, about two years older than me so the same age as Alex. He had messy black curls that pointed up in random directions. He had a smug smile that just hinted at the sides of his mouth.
“Let me go or you’re going to suffer some serious pain,” I said through gritted teeth.
“Try,” he said and his smile broadened.
This really wasn’t going to end well for me today. But it would probably be that last day that I spent alive though. I looked around to try and locate my bow. It was too far away to even try and reach. What did I have? I had to remember that there was a knife at my throat. Knife … I had a knife in my boot.
I just needed a distraction. I closed my eyes for a second and cleared my mind before opening them and kneeing him in the balls. Just like I thought he would, he recoiled, letting me go in the process. I ran over to my bow, loaded it up and spun around to shoot him but he was gone.
Knowing this trick, I spun around on my heels to face him but my feet immediately disappeared from beneath me causing me to stumble and fall backwards onto my back, the force of the fall made me let go of the arrow. I had no idea where it went. Bugger. That was my only arrow.
I was suddenly acutely aware that I was being straddled with my hands pinned above my head. The werewolf boy was right on top of me! He was smiling as though he was impressed with himself.
“Now that didn’t exactly go your way, did it?” he smiled at me.
“Get off me,” I practically growled.
“Ha, ha, … no,” he laughed.
“Who’s the alpha?” I said changing the topic.
He raised his eyebrow at me and chuckled. “I don’t think that you’re really in the position to ask questions. Why do you want to know?”
“You gonna kill me?” I asked confidently avoiding his question just as he had done to mine.
“Haven’t really decided yet,” he answered like he was thinking. “Oh, by the way, your friend … the brown-haired boy with blonde streaks, he put up a brilliant fight."
“Stop,” I commanded before it got any worse as I thought of poor Henry, running for his life like the rest of us but not quote making it.
“It was great fun-”
“Stop!” I said in a much more warning tone.
“Trying to rip him-”
“STOP!” I screamed at him in such a pleading voice that I was surprised it had come out of my mouth.
“So you did like him?” he smirked as a tear ran down my cheek.
“I’d known him since I was seven!” I cried trying to justify why I was crying.
“What about the other boy we killed? Did you know him since you were seven too?” he asked with no emotions on his face, almost like he thought I was lying.
I couldn’t bring myself to speak for fear that I was just going to start crying. Before today I hadn’t cried since my parents had died. I hadn’t cried for ten years of my life. They had killed Alex and I hated to think what was happening to poor Bree if she was still alive.
“How many of you are left?” he asked.
“Here?” I sniffled.
“Yeah, here.”
“Ten, including me,” I lied controlling my breathing.
"Liar, tell me the truth," he smiled.
"Three."
“Three,” he said thoughtfully. “I’m going to need to deal with those other two.”
Terror filled me and I needed a distraction. I couldn’t let Nathan and Jade die! They needed to grow old and have kids together! They couldn’t … this couldn’t … no! I slammed my head into the soft ground in frustration and looked up to the grey sky just in time to see three pigeons fly over. They were free. They weren't trained to kill since a young age.
“Let them go,” I said with my eyes still fixated on the sky as I tried to not let the tears that had been forming in my eyes fall. I found my eyes trailing a small flock of wood pigeons that flew up above. In those few seconds I thought about how free they were, how free they were unlike us.
“Why?” he asked curiously as he cocked his head to one side bringing my attention back to his face.
“Because they love each other!” I said exasperatedly now looking at him.
“Great reason, five gold stars however nothing is to stop them from coming and killing my pack,” he sighed.
“Like this?” a voice said.
I looked up to see Jade and Nathan both with guns pointed at the werewolf on top of me. A smile broke across my face.
“You’re out of silver bullets,” the werewolf boy smiled."I made sure of that. Did you know that our armoury is now full stocked?"
“Not out of normal ones though,” Nathan said and let lose five rounds at the werewolf who then rolled off me.
I pushed myself up off the ground so fast that all the blood rushed to my head but Jade was already pulling me along. We ran and within seconds I felt normal and I was running so fast that I was pulling Jade and Nathan along behind me.
I heard a howl behind us and it sent a shiver down my spine. Where were we going? I somehow managed to shout the question at them.
“We’re … just running … and hoping … to … stumble … across something … that might … save … our lives,” Jade answered breathlessly.
Lack of sleep really wasn't helping this situation. I was still the fastest but we had only been running for a couple of minutes and I already felt like my stamina was dying. No! I could do this! I focused all my energy onto powering my legs and keeping a firm grip on Jade who had a firm grip on Nathan.
I kept running even though my breathing was becoming ragged and every breath burned my lungs and throat like fire and ice. The only thing that kept me from falling into the undergrowth was Jade. The person who had been a friend to me in my brief year of care system and the person I had trained with my whole life.
I couldn’t let her die! We had defeated packs of werewolves, clans of vampires, choruses of banshees and hags, and that wasn’t even everything. She had saved my life so many times that I had lost count and I’d done the same for her. This wasn’t going to happen! She was going to live!
“NATHAN!” I heard her shout hoarsely but I kept pulling her.
I refused to let her go. I had no idea where we were running to but we had to but suddenly I heard a helicopter above us. Of course! Our trackers! I knew John wouldn’t have left us! I knew that he would be coming to rescue us!
I saw it land just a little way off. Seeing it, gave me that extra boost. It gave my legs a little extra power just to get there. I was running as fast as humanly possible.
The helicopter was getting closer and closer to us. I could now distinguish John waiting to pull us up and Max flying it. Keep running, was all I could think about. I shoved Jade forwards into John’s outstretched arms. He pulled her up and then turned to me and stretched out a hand just as I felt something grab me by the back of my jacket.
“No!” I heard John shout as the helicopter began to move away.
I knew what was going to happen now, so I lay still with my eyes closed and just listened to my hoarse and heavy breathing. I felt sick and I needed air but no matter how much I breathed, I couldn’t get enough of it, what made it worse was that each breath stung.
Then nothing. Dying had just felt like I had passed out. Maybe my heart had just stopped beating.
***
I remember briefly opening my fuzzy eyes for enough time to see somebody carrying me. The werewolf boy?
I muttered something that made him laugh but I wasn’t sure what. Then it felt like I passed out again. Perhaps I wasn’t dead. Shit ... I wasn’t dead!