I promise you, I wasn't always like this. I was born sane, and then something went completely wrong. I swear I haven't always been this way!
My name is Husky, but, for some reason, people always referred to me as Spearmint. Probably because that’s the only type of gum I ever carry. Who ever thought a nickname could revolve over something as miniscule as that? No matter how many times I beg, though, people won't stop calling me Spearmint.
Anyways, I should probably start out when I was a sophomore in high school. That’s when things became loopy. I met the girl I've been dying to meet since the day I was born. Her name is Blanca. She was nice, pretty, popular, and everyone liked her, including me. Of course I would like her!
We went out for about two months. We always talked on the phone each night and our parents would scold us for using up so many minutes. I felt like I was going to marry her. HA! How I fell for it! Winter break finally came, and she told me she was going somewhere, which ruined my plans of hanging out with her. At least exams were over and I could hang out with some friends of mine, since they weren't travelling.
Once the break was over and she came back, she looked so strange. Her hair used to be blonde, and then it was black. It used to be short and curly, like a Shirley Temple hairdo, and then it was straight and long. Her eyes used to be a beautiful blue and filled with life, and then they were pitch black and blank. When I walked up to talk to her, she told me in monotone that she had changed during the break and she suddenly broke up with me. I was, and still am, heartbroken. Not because we broke up but because she transformed into her opposite. I can still hear her words echoing in my head "Spear, we're through," in the cold, monotone she used.
People change all the time. But Blanca was different. Scary different. I knew something was wrong. Women say they have a sixth sense. I assume guys do too, because I even felt sick.
On a Friday, I decided to go to her house. I've been there hundreds of times, and her parents liked me, so I thought it would be okay. That’s right. I thought it would be okay. Blanca walked off the school campus into the nearby forest, in the opposite direction of her house. I followed her instead. Something was up, and it wasn't the sky I was thinking of.
For the past week in school, Blanca wouldn't speak to anyone, not even her friends. When she'd sit at her desk, she would stare blankly at the whiteboard, with her back straight and her arms by her side. When a teacher called on her, guessing she was daydreaming, she would mumble "I dunno." A teacher almost wrote her up for detention.
She was stiffly speed-walking into the forest, like soldier, but she wasn't marching. I tried to keep up with her, but it was difficult to stay out of sight as well. Occasionally, she would stop and look back, but, strangely, it seemed like a pattern. Every hundred steps or so, she would look around to make sure she wasn't being stalked. She stopped abruptly, turned around a full circle, and then continued. All the more reason to see what's going on.
After about a mile and a half, (this is a total guess. I don't know exactly how far a mile and a half is) I could see a small log cabin. The trees surrounding it were bare, making it blend in perfectly, like camouflage.
Blanca walked right up to the door and performed a series of knocks, using her knuckles and nails. The door creaked open, and I quickly hid behind a bush that was conveniently next to me. I listened for the door to click shut, and then I slowly snuck up to a window in the cabin. I crouched under it and I peered inside the cabin. Blanca was sitting at a wooden table and in front of her was a candle. The sun had begun to set, so the candle was very bright, almost blinding in the diminishing light. All she did was sit there and wait. A door opened that was connected to the room from where Blanca was and a good-looking junior or senior joined her. He had the same black hair and blank eyes. If I wasn't mistaken, he was Blanca's brother, David. There was a chair next to where Blanca was sitting and he took it in the same, stiff movement she used.
For fifteen minutes, they sat still like gargoyles, motionless, hardly even breathing, staring at the candle in front of them. Suddenly, a man walked in from the same door where David entered. He was plump, short, had a bushy, brown mustache, a hideous toupee, and a yellowish-green coat. He walked in and took a chair that was opposite from the zombies. Another man followed, thinner, younger, with a clean shave, and a hooded jacket. He was dressed more casual than the first guy.
They both took their seats and sat in front of Blanca and David. What a strange sight to see! The candle seemed to be the center of the universe for them, for that is the only thing they focused on. However, the two older men weren’t stiff and strange like Blanca and David. The chubbier man spoke first.
"Excellent work today," he said. Blanca and David suddenly gave a wide smile, and then disappeared just as quickly.
"Please go through door," said the plump man, breaking between each word.
Blanca and David stood up stiffly, marched around the table, opened the door and walked right into the next room. The two men remained sitting. The thinner man spoke this time, a very strong voice he had.
"This is working out way better than I thought," he said. "I never thought that hypnotism could work that way."
So they're hypnotized? I thought. I started breathing faster. It's definitely harder to get them out now, I thought.
I quickly thought about running to the police. I began scurrying away from the cabin when, all of a sudden, I hear a voice calling "Hey! You! Get back here!" I was running by then, but then I felt a sharp hit on the back of my head. I turn around and find a man I haven't seen before was closer than I thought. He had hit me on the head with an empty beer bottle. I felt dizzy, and then BAM! He hit me again and total darkness drowned me.
* * * * *
When I slowly awoke, there was a pain in the back of my head. I tried to rub it to sooth the pain but I quickly discovered that my wrists and ankles were tied with prickly rope. I was in the cabin in a room that was obscure from where I was outside. It might have been the room from where the men came in from.
There was a table with a lit candle on top and surrounding the table were a few chairs, just like the other room. What was different was that around the walls there were shelves filled with many historical books and…no windows. What I suddenly realized was that Blanca and her brother weren't here either.
As if on cue to my sitting up noise, the plump man, the casual guy, and the mediocre murderer walked into the room. The man who had bonked me on the head is the mediocre murderer I am referring to. He had jet black hair tied back in a perfect ponytail. He had sharp features, and his face, from the instant it appeared in the light, sent the hair on the back of my neck on end. He was wearing a very nice black jacket, matching perfectly with his slacks. Immediately, I could tell who was in charge.
They all turned their chairs to face me and sat down. I straightened myself to try and show that I was not afraid, even though I really was panicking. Yes, panicking! They had my dear girl and her brother hypnotized, it was evident what could happen to me!
The plump man had an upset look on him, as if he couldn't believe I was there. The casual guy slouched in his chair; arms crossed, and had a sly smirk on his face that sent more chills down my spine. It was as if my suffering humored him. The boss, or so I thought that's who he is, sat with very good posture, and had an unusually warm smile on his face. If it wasn't for what was going on, I would like to meet him.
"Well, we'll just get right to it; how did you find this place?" asked the casual guy.
I didn't know what to say. Should I lie? Will they hypnotize me, or worse? I decided to toughen up and try to get answers.
"You hypnotized them? Why? What did Blanca do? Let me go!" I yelled.
"We can only answer so many questions, boy," said the casual. His smirk widened.
"Oh, I see, you must be Blanca's boyfriend," said the boss. "Or, I mean, 'Ex.'"
So they were behind that all along. Anger fumed inside of me. I knew Blanca wouldn't have left me just like that without reason. By why did they do that?
"Why did you make her break up with me?" I asked, infuriated.
"We figured you of all people would be concerned for her, since she doesn’t…respond like she used to," said the boss. The men chuckled. My nose flared.
"Let me and my friends go," I growled through clenched teeth.
"What do they teach you now-a-days in high school? Obviously not grammar!" The men howled in laughter at the remark of what the plump man said. Yes, they laughed at me! They laughed at my sweat and fear building in me. But they also laughed at my increasing anger. I swear, I could have exploded!
"How would you like to join us, kid?" asked the boss. The casual gave a sudden glare at the boss. The boss gave a satisfactory nod back to him. "You see, we earn a lot of money. All you have to do, is do what I tell you to do. Simple enough?"
"That’s right, it's too easy. Why would I turn to you for help? You're the ones who tied me up in the first place! You all should just crawl back to the deepest place in he-"
"Mr. Robin, would you mind helping this poor boy out? I think he seems unable to sleep," said the boss smoothly.
The plump man stood up, quickly telling me that he was Mr. Robin.
"Help me out, Rock," said Mr. Robin to the casual guy. His smirk came right back. He stood up and walked toward the corner where I was sitting with my ankles tied and my wrists tied behind me. I started screaming and yelling as loud as I could. Almost like a child! I was begging to be saved by a superhero like in the movies, but, that's just it; it's only in the movies.
"Get away from me!" I yelled. I threw my legs up in the air trying to kick him, but I missed and my feet landed with a thud on the wooden floor. He grabbed my upper arm and pulled me up roughly. What surprised me was how strong he was. His lazy behavior was very misleading. He held both of my shoulders and tried to pull me up so I would hop into a chair. But I wasn’t gonna give up like that. I made myself become dead weight so that he might give up. But, like I said, he was strong. He just dragged me across the floor and pulled me up onto a chair, while I was yelling the whole time.
Once I was on the chair, Rock struck my face with his hand.
"Will you shut up?" he yelled. He was serious, so I didn't hesitate to quiet down. The boss lost his warm smile, and it was replaced with a frown. He reached into his pocket and out came a black pistol. He showed it to me, but didn't point it at me.
"No fooling around, alright?" he said calmly. I quickly understood. What was I going to do then? I couldn’t disobey him or he'd shoot me! I had to do what he told me to do, otherwise…
"What do you want from me?" I asked with a broken voice.
"Well, since you know our plans and we've treated you this way-" said Mr. Robin.
"What plans? I don’t know anything!" I yelled. It's true. I only knew that they used hypnotism on my friends and tied me up and hit me, but that’s all.
"Cool it, alright?" said Rock. He pulled out his own pistol. Beads of sweat formed around my hairline and began to drip, as if from a heavy workout.
"Don’t fake it, kid. And besides, we're going to give you two options," said the boss. "Option number one is to join our group, and option number two is to join our group. So, which is it going to be?" He chuckled at his pathetic joke.
"So many options, I can't decide," I remarked. Rock suddenly became furious.
"I guess it's option three!" he yelled, and he gave me another blow right across the other cheek. It stung so much, it was hard to bear.
"Take it easy, Rock," soothed Mr. Robin. He laid a hand on Rock's shoulder and pulled him back.
The boss looked at Mr. Robin, gave him a quick nod, and strode out of the room.
Mr. Robin mumbled something to Rock. Something about keeping me sitting up straight. Rock went through the room opposite where the boss went and he came back with a new coil of rope. He walked over to me and tied me to the chair. I tried to resist, but he was stronger and he made me sit upright. Mr. Robin sat in the chair at the other side of the table and looked at me, with the horrific candle in between us. Oh, the candle!
"What is your name?" he asked. I turned my head away from him. Rock was behind me and he turned my head to face him.
"Do what the doc. tells you to do. Got it?" he growled. He forced my head back toward Mr. Robin, almost spraining my neck.
"My name is Husky," I said.
"Very nice name," said Mr. Robin. His voice was soothing now. "Do you play any sports?" He's trying to make me fall for his tricks, but I didn't. I figured he must be the hypnotist. I tried to play along for a little bit, but once the questions were over, I'd fight.
"Uh, yeah. Tennis." I said, trying to play along.
"Do you like music? What kind?"
"Love it. I'm into rock."
"Do you move a lot?"
"What?"
"Do you change houses?"
"Twice."
"I see. Now here's what I want you to do." Here it came. My revolt. "I want you to look at the candle in front of you and slowly calm yourself down.
"I'm not going to," I mumbled.
"Not smart, bud," Rock said.
I remember the candle being so bright, almost burning through my eyes on how bright it was. Mr. Robin stood up and told Rock "Number three!" And then he blew out the candle. Since the candle was so bright in the dark room, it was pitch darkness for me. I couldn't even look down and see my legs. But, somehow, Rock could see. He began beating me up. He punched my jaw, hit my shoulder, kicked my leg, stepped on my feet. I couldn't figure out what to do since I was blind. I decided to scream and yell.
"Help! Stop! Somebody! Ah!" I screamed. He gave me a bloody nose, and I could feel the blood trickle down to my lip. It had that strange metal taste, just like blood always tastes like. I spat it out and I heard Rock yell. It felt good to know that I got him somehow. But, just like karma, he gave me a rock-hard punch on my cheek, sending me and the chair I was bound to to the floor. He then punched me in the stomach, and left me gasping for air. Now I knew why this place was windowless; it was so that these goons could beat up people without them fighting back. But how could Rock see?
"Help!" I yelled again. My mouth was then covered with masking tape. I heard a match being struck and then the candle came back to life. Rock stood up the chair and me so we could face the candle again. The burning candle, which slowly melted, and the flame waving back and forth in the same repeated motion. Oh, the candle!
I was still tied to the chair, but my head hung down, my chin to my chest, limp.
"So, do we have to start over? We're on a tight schedule, Husky," Mr. Robin said.
"mmf," I managed to say. Since he didn't catch on, I showed him by shaking my head "no".
"Very good. Now, imagine yourself-"
The boss bursts in through the door. "We need to leave. Now."
"But the boy. He's not-" began Mr. Robin.
"Never mind. Just bring him. A hostage never hurt," he said. What a fool! "Bring the candles, Rock."
"Alright," Rock said. He blew them out, making me go blind again. I started panicking. For some reason, my instincts felt that I was going to get beaten up again, so I started screaming. Of course, though, all you could hear is a muffle. But it was so strange! I knew that we were going to leave. I knew Rock wasn’t going to beat me up now, but I started freaking out. And to add to it, Rock blindfolded me with a bandana and my instincts didn’t like that. Even when common sense was screaming to get a grip, my body was scared and shocked and…it was like a war! I realized then that I wasn’t my normal self anymore.
* * * * *
Rock and Mr. Robin picked me up and threw me in a pickup truck. I knew it was a pickup truck because I wasn’t forced through any doors, and I knew it was Rock and Mr. Robin because the boss didn’t look like the kind of guy who would get his hands dirty, and I heard some heavy breathing after I was in the truck. It must have been poor Mr. Robin, almost giving up.
Some doors slammed, the engine roared, I could feel the truck moving, and then come to an abrupt stop.
"Idiot!" yelled the boss, and then some muffled mumbling. Someone came out of the truck and ran back to the cabin, I think. I wasn’t quite sure since I was blindfolded. Yes, blindfolded!
Whoever ran back to the cabin came back. He hopped onto the truck and forced me to lie down. I tried yelling, but the stupid duck tape was super sticky. He used the same rope from the chair and tied me to the hooks in the floor of the truck, keeping me from sitting up. And then, he placed a heavy blanket over me. I saw then that they were probably going on the highway, and they didn’t want onlookers noticing there's a hostage in the back. He tied the ends of the blanket to the hooks and jumped of the end. A door opened, slammed, and we were moving again.
During the drive, I wasn’t thinking of ways to escape. I thought it was useless. They had me bound and covered. I couldn’t see or say anything, and the war that occurred inside me before started up again. I tried to calm myself down but I knew that wouldn’t do any good. Instinct was so powerful. So strong! I was shaking all over, like being left outside in my shorts during a blizzard.
For hours, it seemed, they drove. Now, don’t start thinking I'm stupid, now. I did carry a cell with me, but the goons aren’t that stupid, either. They searched me and took it. I would have called earlier, when I was watching Blanca and David stare aimlessly at the candle, but I didn’t feel a threat. And when I heard that they were hypnotized, I was loosing it. I had to run. Run! And see what that got me.
I could still see the candle. The flickering candle. That was the only thing I could see. And slowly, I realized it was driving me insane. Completely insane! I felt my heart beat racing, beating my ribs to pulp. Fresh sweat dripped, and the blood from my nose began hardening. Every part of me was sore. The bandana around my eyes felt like it was getting tighter, and the rope splintered my wrists and ankles. I was lying on top of my arms, since they were tied behind me, so the circulation started numbing my hands. The ropes tied across my chest made it harder and harder for me to breathe.
The truck stopped, and I slid forward just a centimeter. The heavy blanket was pulled off of me, and through the bandana and my eyelids, I could see a hint of light. The air smelled really humid. Someone pulled off the blindfold, and I started breathing heavily through my nose at the sight of even more people looking down on me. Rock untied the ropes binding me to the truck and sat me up. Around twenty other guys were looking back at me. I realized I was in an old barn kind of place. It was huge, though. And there was hay, for some reason, in a few corners. I peered up and saw the roof of the barn, two stories high, stronger than the walls of the barn. There might have been some repairs in the past.
There were probably twenty people looking back at me. I looked at a corner and there was a pile of hay, and sitting on top were Blanca, David, and two other people with the same style they had. The barn was fairly bright, with fluorescent lights hanging around everywhere. I glanced back towards the front of the truck, which was the back of the barn, and I saw, to my greatest horror, a sawmill.
"Well, at least you survived the ride, kid," the boss said. "But we know you won't leave this barn alive."
What is it they want from me? Why did I have to even get into this mess? I thought. My heart was pounding through my chest.
"Ray, you're in charge of him," said the boss. A blond guy, probably a junior in high school, was dressed in a black jacket and underneath was a nice white shirt. He wore black slacks and very nice black shoes, and he started walking toward me. He must have been Ray. Oh, Ray! How horrible he was!
"Can some of you guys help me out?" said Ray to the crowd. I noticed that Mr. Robin was headed toward Blanca and the other ones were sitting with blank expressions. Out of nowhere, Ray grabbed my shirt collar and dragged me out of the truck and threw me on the dirt, face down. The other boys laughed. Ray turned me over and tore off the tape over my mouth. It felt as if I would never grow a mustache ever again! It was so painful!
"You b-!" I began. But Ray kicked my legs, right where Rock kicked me earlier. I never had a broken leg before, but I was guessing it felt like that. More laughter.
Ray and a few other guys dragged me to a stall that was nearby. They put on their eyes some sort of strange glasses. Ray told one of the guys to light a candle and place it on the ground in front of me. Automatically, adrenaline and fear surged through me and images from before came back to me. They set up the candle, and, strangely, they made it so that the fluorescent lights faded into darkness. All that was left was the flickering candle.
Ray sat me up on the floor and forced me to look right at the candle. For what felt like half an hour, I sat looking at the candle, the whole time praying for them not to blow it out, for I knew what would follow the smoke. Ray was holding my head and the other guys were hidden in the candle's shadows. In the distance, but I didn't know quite where, I heard the sawmill engine roar to life. One of the guys came into view in the candlelight and blew it out.
Immediately afterward, I was kicked, punched, even bitten on my arm by the guys that surrounded me. I yelled back, trying to make them stop, but who would listen to me? At one point I heard screaming. And to me, it sounded like Blanca's voice.
"NO! Stop! Don’t kill her!" I screamed. The kicking stopped, and Ray pulled up my ear and said "Here you are, dying yourself, and all you think of is Blanca?"
"I love her! Leave her alone!" I screamed.
"That’s a little late, bud," said Ray. "She's gonna become mulch pretty soon."
One of the other guys lit the candle again. Ray walked around so that the candle was between us. "You really want to see her?" said Ray.
Blanca was still screaming, so I knew she wasn’t dead…yet.
I heard someone pull Blanca off the sawmill and they brought her to the candlelight. It was Rock who took her off the sawmill and brought her over into the candlelight. She looked at me and had a sad expression. She's finally out of the trance, I thought.
"Husky! Look what they've done to you!" she screamed. She walked around the candle and gave me a hug. A stiff hug.
"What have you done to her," I growled at Rock.
"Given her back to you," he said.
"But the normal Blanca doesn't call me Husky," I told them. Rock became slightly pale. What somehow amazed me was how Blanca was able to say my name under hypnosis, but not what she normally calls me. It's like she became one of those answering machines for the phone and my name is the "insert name here" part.
Ray came and sat down next to me. He held my head and turned it toward the candle once again. I began breathing quickly again, and Ray noticed.
"What's wrong? Afraid of a candle?" he chuckled. "It looks as if you're going insane!" Oh, how right he was. Rock took Blanca away, and she didn’t hesitate to leave. She was still hypnotized, that was for sure.
"So, look at the candle," said Ray. His buddies started snickering.
"Let go of me," I growled.
"Oh, you were stressed out I thought maybe you needed to be relieved!" said Ray.
He gave a nod and out went the flame. More torture was given to me. They kicked and punched me. I almost passed out when there were yells and screams.
"They found us!" yelled one of the guys. Ray and his companions stopped hitting me. Fresh blood oozed from my nose down to my upper lip again. Car tires screeched to a stop in front of the barn.
"This is the police! Open the door now!" someone from outside yelled.
I didn’t know what to think. I knew he said he was police, but I felt I couldn’t trust anyone, even the police.
Ray was on my right side. He reached across my chest and held my left shoulder, pulled me up so that I would stand, and he brought me toward the entrance of the barn. He then placed something cold next to my head.
"One wrong move and he gets it!" yelled Ray.
"Let him go!" yelled an officer.
"Ah! Help! The candle!" I screamed. That’s all I could think of; the candle encrypted into my head. It was the only thing I could see. "Help me!"
Although I couldn’t see what was going on, I figured that Ray's buddies ran in front of him to block the police. He threw me forward and ran off. I landed on the floor with a hard hit.
"No! Spearmint!" screamed Blanca. She was out of it? But how?
Bang.
Blanca was shot by one of the officers since the friends of Ray open fired. She fell to the ground next to me. She whispered into my ear "I love you, Spear."
"Blanca! Blanca…Blan…ca…" I slowly lost consciousness.
* * * * *
I woke up in the hospital a week later. I had a cast around my wrist and stitches on my forehead. Bruises covered me. I felt so weak and sore. A police officer walked in when he noticed I woke up.
"Are you alright?" he said.
"No."
"Well, these injuries aren’t too bad. You should recover-"
"I don’t mean that. My girlfriend is dead because you are responsible for it!"
He looked at me with a guilty expression. Of course, he should be guilty!
"Look, she moved, and the enemy open fired. We had no choice; we thought she was one of them."
"She wasn’t one of them! She was hypnotized!" I sat up abruptly.
"Take it easy," he soothed.
"NO! It's your fault! It's your fault! It's…your…" I broke out in tears.
"How is your head? A nurse told me you lost it a little." Changing the subject, huh? I hated it.
"You're losing it! You don’t know how to shoot!" A nurse came in and asked for the officer to leave. He stood up and was about to leave, but I had to know something.
"Did you catch them?" I asked quickly. He gave a sigh. That’s never a good sign.
"We caught everyone except four, and they may have been the top guys."
I raised the hand that didn’t have the cast. I felt so good not to have any ropes around it. I gave a motion for him to leave. He left, and I felt heavy, and strange.
Once the officer left, the nurse took a whiff in the room I was in and winced.
"What? I don’t smell good?" I said.
"Oh, it's not you, dear. It's from the one nearby. He has some strange disease that gives off some sort of odor."
"Huh, what is it?" I asked.
"I don’t have a clue, dear," she said. That gave me a little bit of concern. I guessed nurses were only around to look good. "I'll be back in a flash."
She took a little longer than a flash, but she finally came back with something green in her hand. She placed it on the table near the window in my room and struck a match. She placed it inside the cylindrical object and blew out the flame from the match.
"Studies show that if you're in a pleasant mood, you'll heal faster," she said.
My breathing started up. Even though it was broad daylight, I felt like I was in total darkness again waiting for the beating. Insanity pulsed through me.
"Get r-rid of it!" I yelled.
"Alright, calm down. I'll blow it out," she said calmly, not knowing that I was more frightened than she thought I was.
"No! J-just take it away!" I screamed. "Ah! Help!" Nightmares flooded back to me. The nurse started panicking. She went toward the phone and called the doctor.
"Get rid of i-it!" I yelled. Why couldn’t she take it away? I then felt as if I had given up. I started laughing like a mad person. Like an insane man. "Ah-ha-ha-ha!"
I couldn't stop laughing! It felt somewhat good. Satisfying. The doctor burst in and came to my bedside.
"Husky, take deep breaths. Calm down," he said.
"Don’t kill me! Please! Let me go!" I screamed.
"Husky! You're in a hospital! You're alright!"
"Ah! Somebody help me!"
"Nurse, get that candle out of here!" She quickly took it and ran out. I slowly relaxed, and my breathing slowly calmed.
"Husky, what was wrong?"
"It's almost like…hypnosis, but being conscious. What am I going to do? Am I crazy?" Of course I am not!
"I hear there is a place where people can help you get over traumas like what happened to you at the barn. Soon you won't have to worry about anything."
I found it hard to believe. That's just it; I couldn’t believe it.
"Thank you, doctor."
* * * * *
I had promised my parents and somewhat convinced them that I wouldn't go crazy at the sight of a candle. How they fell for it! I was finally able to go to school after two weeks, though, and word got out that Blanca had died. Probably David's doing. In fact, I met him in the hallway, and he wanted to talk to me.
"Look, uh, thanks a lot for trying to save Bla…my sister," he said, almost breaking up. He pinched the bridge of his nose to keep from crying.
"No problem. I mean, I wish I could have…you know, kept whatever happened from happening."
"Thank you for thinking of her, though. If it weren’t for you, I'd still be-"
"Yeah, I know. See yeah around," I said. I couldn’t keep talking to him or else I would start falling apart.
During a slow class, I began thinking of the goons. They had so much power, just with a candle. They drove me insane and paranoid. They were like top class torturers. I wanted that kind of power. I wanted to avenge against the idiot who killed Blanca. I wanted…I want power.
* * * * *
After school on a Friday, once again, I walk into the forest toward the cabin. Somehow, I remembered where this place was. Maybe because I was so concerned about…
Anyway, I walk around rocks and trees that might be somewhat familiar. Soon enough, I confront the cabin. I felt earlier that I might find some clue that would lead to the group. I push open the door and it creaks open easily. I step inside and find it just the way it was before, table and chairs in place. I open the next door that leads into the other room where I was at. The table is there too, but all the books are gone. I look around for a note, paper, anything. It's hard to see in the dark, though. I feel around on the table and find, to my relief, my cell phone. It's off, so I turn it on. I find a new message with a number I don’t recognize. The message reads: Here's our number in case we can be of any service to you. I decide to call the number. A familiar voice answers.
"Husky! What a pleasure to speak with you!" the boss says, a little perky.
"Hello. I've thought about it, and I think I'll take option number one. Where should I meet you?"
[align=center]End of Book I[/align]