Young Writers Society

Gab

When are we going to get to this damned 'Safty zone'! If there even is one. This is probably a wild ride they are taking us on! It's not fun, and I want it to stop. I sighed while finishing putting up my tent.

“Hello?” I heard Ash call. I turn around to see who she was talking to, there was no one there.

"Ash... There's no one there," I shake my head and walk over to her, "This place is turning us all crazy," I put and arm on her shoulder.

"I'm not, Gab, I know what I saw."

"Okay, okay, I'll go check it out." I walk slowly towards the 'moving bush ', "Yo?" I walked past some trees. A girl jumped out at my and held her dagger out, "Don't stab me! I'm not a mutant!" I put my hands up. "I'm Gabriel," I wiped my dirty hand on my shirt and put it out to her, "Urm, maybe you shouldn't shake my hand..." I pulled it back before she grabbed it. "Gonna tell me your name?" I ask looking into her brown eyes, she hesitates for a second.

" Erica," she says with a small smile.

"Well, I should probable take you back to the camp... Z and Q, would want to see you."

"ZQ, what?" she frowns.

"Its hard to explain, just come on, and please put the dagger down, might hurt yourself."

"Couldn't be worse them your arm," she took a second look and saw the smaller scars and cuts around the gash, "No, I didn't mean it like tha-"

"It's cool, come on..." I took her arm leading her back to the camp. I looked down at my arms, they really did look bad...

Ash

Ash stood back and watched straight-faced as Gab walked over to the bush and was promptly attacked by a girl with long brown hair, with a dagger.

“Don’t stab me! I’m not a mutant!”

We’ll that’s probably already clear. Mutants can’t talk. Not properly anyway.

Ash waits at the edge of the field by a tree as they eventually walk over.

“Uh… Hi,” she says to the girl, “I’m Ash.”
The brown haired girl nods, a curious look on her face, “I’m Erica. What’s going on?”
Ash thinks about it for a second.

What IS even going on anymore? We’re on a JOURNEY. People are disappearing here and there. And still no sight of anything Safety Zone related…

“Meh. I’d like to tell you something, but I have this really bad problem with explaining stuff… The problem being that… well I can’t. So you might want to wait until you meet Q… or Z. They’ve pretty much got all that stuff down pack.”

“Who are Q and Z?”

“They’re agents…. They’re kinda in charge of the Journey, I guess. And telling us what to do-“

She looks over to Gab for help but he just shrugs.

Ash shake my head. “Yeah, I think that Q and Z will be so much more helpful with this.”
They all start to walk off again and Ash grins over at Gab. “Told ya so…”

He rolls his eyes but is smiling slightly. Ash can almost ignore the pain in her head now. When she’s with other people and death or mutants isn’t the only thing on their minds.

A minute later they walk back into the campsite. And freeze on the spot at what they see.

Ayumi

"What are you doing?" Ayumi struggled to keep up with her father's catlike movements. "Father, what did you say to Jeydon? Do you know him?"
Her father did not respond.
"Father, where are we going?"
"All shall be revealed," the large man replied silkily.

Ayumi alternated between a furious walk and a trot, trying to draw level with her father. They moved deeper into the ever-darkening forest. The leaves glinted dully in the twilight. Ayumi ran a sprig of elder through her hand. Her fingers came away sticky and darkened. She sniffed her hand, paused, and touched the tip of her tongue to her fingers.
"Father, I go no further."
Ayumi halted and regarded her father with level eyes. Her hand subtly moved toward her pocket, where her poisoned needles — were not to be found.
"I took the precaution of removing your weapons," her father smiled. "I anticipated this eventuality, of course."
Ayumi stood in silent frustration. She could neither understand nor fight this man — her own father — with words or weapons.
"I have... responsibilities," she said stiffly. "I cannot accompany you."
Her father moved swiftly and soundlessly. Ayumi turned to face him, but a single needle was already embedded deep within her spine and an icy paralysis spread from her back to her fingertips.
"Father! Please, no!"
"Obey me, Ayumi!" For the first time, a hint of emotion crept into her father's voice. Ayumi felt the needle bite deeper into her flesh. Her father grasped her arm in one large hand.
"You're hurting me!"
"This pain is nothing. Did I not teach you to overcome it? Did I not show you the secrets of the mind? Why did you leave me?" her father demanded. "Why did you leave me alone on this island?"
"You raped my mother and left her to die in this forest. I have no commitments toward you. I was never your daughter! I was never—" Ayumi cut herself off as she felt her father's grip on her arm tighten.
"You are either my daughter, or a stranger in these woods," he said quietly. "In the first case, you are welcome here. In the second..."
His hand moved down her arm to touch her rigid fingertips. The fingertips which were covered in blood.

Jason

He looked above, at the sky, only this time he wasn't at the same place, only this time he was where he was meant to be. Jason had arrived in the safety Zone but soon left it due to some circumstance. He had found out that his sister Aliasa was seen somewhere near the place a while ago and set to find her. Days had past and his hope had just gotten worse by the second. The only survivors from his family were him and Aliasa.

He lost her when she was 5 and had always been searching for her. It was the guilt of losing her that made him what he was today. Today, a fortnight has past and now he knows he has to return to the Safety Zone if he wants to survive. He had gone really frail and weak going out on his own. His smile was long gone and his clothes were pretty torn, maybe because he had to search through the most roughest areas.

He picked up the bag he had taken with him and headed back towards the Safety Zone. Though he had been having the worst times, he knew that if he wanted to survive he had to go back there. He remembered everyone there and smiled after looking at all their concerned expressions when he told them he was leaving.

In the bag of all horrible memories, that was the sweetest one. This was strange but he did feel like going to the Safety Zone was better than anything ever happened to him in these few years. It felt to him like family.

After a couple of hours, he finally reached the Safety Zone. He entered the Zone and saw surprised faces. Everyone stared at me like I was one of the mutant only they weren't scared rather they had an expression that I couldn't read. Out of nowhere a girl comes and hugs me tight.

"Oh my god, I never thought you would make it alive J" she cried

"Umm, who are you" I asked pulling her away and was surprised to see who it was. "Erina" I murmured.

"Who else did you think? Have you forgotten me so fast . . . brother" She said with a smile. tears rolled down my face. It was really her, I had finally found my sister.

Jeydon

I awoken, no one was around. The tent was still on the ground where I last saw it. "Ayumi!!!" I yell. No reply, I ran through the trail in the woods looking everywhere and made sure I had my gun. I did. Walking and walking I knew Ayumi was here. "Help me." I heard a voice going around my head over and over. I seen what looked like Ayumi's face covered in blood. "No!!!" I scream and run to find her. "You have to be near, Ayumi." I say.

Finally I heard commotion in the woods north of me. It was Ayumi and her father, I waited a moment and got my gun ready. "Your hurting me!" I heard her say. That is when I knew I had to pull the trigger, on my own...my own..uncle. I pulled it and he fell to the ground and so did Ayumi. I ran up on to them to make sure I did not hurt her. She was fine. She tried to get up with tears falling from her eyes, but it was no use. "Are you okay?" I ask her. She looks at me with tear struck eyes but hate in them all at once.

"Come on, I'm going to bring you back to my camp." I say. I pull her up and put her on my back. She could hardly move so I just gave her a piggy back ride until we finally had reached it. I sat her in the tent and she layed there, eventually falling asleep. I got out of the tent and started to make a fire so we could have something to eat.

Ayumi

A shot rang loud and clear in the frigid air of the forest. Liberating heat flowed down Ayumi's spine as her father's needle was dragged out of her skin.
"Father?"
Ayumi turned to address him, but his eyes were void and his lips slightly open, a dark spot spreading slowly over his forehead. The single hole between his eyes was only the size of a thumbnail, but a drop of blood seeped out of the wound and stained the bridge of his nose a dark purple.
"Father!"
The large man collapsed without a sound and Ayumi fell after him, hitting the forest floor without impact. Her ears were dead to all sound. Her eyes were blind to the decomposing leaves. The only sensation known to her was the pressure of the rushing blood in her throat and the dampness of her tears on her cheeks.

There was a flurry of hurried footsteps through the dead leaves and sensation exploded back into Ayumi's body. She rolled over and struggled to regain her footing, shaking with silent tears of shock. Her joints buckled and she fell to the floor again, dark mud coating her hands. Then there was a strong grip on her arms and she stared into Jeydon's calm features.
"Are you okay?" he asked.
A second shock jolted her and she allowed the tears to run down her face and into her neck. Jeydon brushed them away gently and peeled the dead leaves off her face and shoulders while Ayumi tried to control her emotions.

She wanted to say that he had had no right. She wanted to yell insults at him. She wanted to blame him. But no words came and she was unable to resist him picking her up and carrying her on his back all the way to camp, trudging slowly and resolutely on in the utter darkness, never wavering or straying from the path.

Jeydon placed her on the dry groundsheet of his tent, covered her with a blanket and sat beside her until she drifted into an uneasy, shivering sleep. Her fingertips were still tinged with blood and a single leaf, caught like a butterfly in a web, rustled in the entanglement of her hair.

Erica

This was the closest to an outer body experience Erica had ever gotten. With her senses on edge she had witnessed how a girl came tumbling in right beside her, effectively exposing her site of refuge. For a second she looked right into a pair of large, dark blue eyes in a pale face, then she was gone again. She still wouldn't allow her muscles to relax though, and her teeth remained clenched. Erica heard voices discuss whether she was real or just imagined, then a boy walked over. Knowing that she had been fully exposed, Erica got up, with yet another spark of pain through her leg. She kept the hand holding the dagger between the boy and herself.

With a calm expression the guy introduced himself as Gabriel, and held out his right hand. Erica's right hand was occupied holding the dagger, and she glanced up into the blue eyes. Erica introduced herself as well. The world might be ending, but she would keep up her manners all the same. As Gabriel withdrew his offer, Erica allowed herself to hope for a moment. They were people alright, and she wanted to trust them to badly.

As Gab seized her arm and mentioned something about a camp, she started to become uncomfortable. Even that would be an understatement. More people?

She kept a straight face though, even as the first girl came to introduce herself.
"Q and Z"? Erica asked, frowning. They would explain, Ash said.

Erica felt like all this information about a big group of people and creepy letters was going to make her head spin. That's when someone pulled the trigger.

Regina

Everyone was going crazy, people kept appearing and Jeydon had ran off. Ayumi got took by her father. Wow. So much confusion. "Has anyone found Jeydon yet?" I asked not speaking to no one in particular. "No! Now stop repeatedly asking Regina, we have other stuff to worry about." Ashlee said. Wow that was rude. She looked to me as if she hated me completely. "I hope Ayumi's okay." I say to myself.

Z came over to me and questioned me about Jeydon. "What did he say to you last?" he asked. "That he was leaving and don't fit in." I reply. Z nodded and walked off going to talk to Q and Alison walked up to me. None of this felt normal. "Why the hell did you let Jeydon just walk off like that?!" she screamed at me. Tears welted her eyes. "What did you want me to do?" I asked sternly. Alison walked off and called me a bitch. I felt as though everyone had turned on me just because Jeydon left and Ayumi got took.

They act as though I don't even care when in reality, I loved both of them and I wish they were still here but in the end there was nothing I could do to make Jeydon stop because when his mind was set, it was set. I walked off from the middle of the camp and sat up in a tree. Looking around I realized this place looked completely familiar. It was from all the dreams I had been having the past week or so. I turned to look and see a lake about a mile away.

"I know this place." I say aloud, not hiding it from anyone.

Jeydon

About an hour later Ayumi came out of my tent. "Uhm, where is everybody else?" she asked irratedly. "There is no one else Ayumi, I left the camp and not returning. I have no clue where they are and I'm ok with it." I tell her sternly and look at her in her eyes. She trudged away trying to go look for her friends. "Ash? Gab? Regina?" she yelled.

Rolling my eyes I say, "Ayumi, don't bother, they can't hear you." She sits on the ground with a pouty face. "Really out of everyone. I'm stuck here with you?" she says angrily. "I don't get a thanks? Not even after saving you from my mad man of an uncle?" I ask. Then immediately close my mouth stunned at what I said. "Uncle????" Ayumi questioned. "I didn't mean to blurt that out." I tell her. "You knew he was your uncle the whole time we ever were around each other but never for the love of god told me??" she said.

"I didn't know until yesterday Ayumi, that he was even your father. I barely knew him myself. My dad chose for us to stay away from him when I was real young, I just know what he looks like due to pictures." I tell her. Ayumi's eyes sort of teared up hearing all of this, I think it was in anger.

I got up from the fire and went into the tent. I had nothing else I could say. "Don't walk away from me." Ayumi said with a glare. "This is what you want and I'm giving it to you Ayumi." I say as I walk inside the tent and lay down. She got up with a huff and just turned around standing there.

I'm guessing her mind was wondering through what she had just found out..

Q


Everyone had gone nuts. Q and Z watched as the group wondered around aimlessly looking for Jeydon and Ayumi. Q supposed they would come back on their own time so she sat with Z. Z eventually got up to calm the group but Q stayed. She was exhausted from the week they had been on the run. She laid down across the log and sighed. All she wanted was to get this mission over with so she could go onto bigger missions with Z. Why was she feeling this way? Q was almost always optimistic. Maybe it was the heat, or the lack of food. But still, she was trained for the worst, and a little heat was going to drive her insane!

"Z, I'm going for a walk," Q said sitting up to fast so black dots clouded her vision.

She walked fast towards the water and there she took off the fake leg and hopped into the water using the stick she had used the day before. She sat in the water so only above the chin showed. Q's long hair fanned out in the water around her and she closed her eyes taking in the salty air.

"Hey," Z said sitting down next to her. Q opened her eyes and sat up a bit.

"This place is driving me insane."Q replied propping her self up on her one leg. Z nodded and wrapped an arm around her so the incoming tide didn't push her over.

"We'll be at the Safty zone soon, then we can rest and get our next mission." Z said standing. Q took his outstretched hand and wrapped her arm around his next for support and hopped back to the beach. She wrapped her stub with cloth then put the metal leg back on.

They returned to the beach where they found everyone had returned. Q was relived and sat down to tell the group about the plans about the Safty zone.

"We are almost at the Safty Zone now, we might be there in a matter of days." Q said looking around the dirty teenagers that was the people she was suppose to protect.

"Might," repeated Z with doubt in his voice. Q poked him and nodded. The group groaned and someone had put a fish on the fire to cook for breakfast.

"But, once we get there we will be safe." And right as Q said that a manged looking mutant popped out of a bush. "Crap"

The group instantly ran for their weapons and Q shot out her knife. She ran towards the mutant the jumped over ts head whist stabbing it in the head. She fell onto the ground, rolled, then stood again as maybe a hundred mutants emerged front he forest.

"ATTACK!"

Ayumi

Stuck in a camp with the killer of my father, with no hope of reaching the Safety Zone, Ayumi thought. This is a hopeless situation.
Her mind felt like a thick porridge in a tipping bowl. Everything was sliding out of control. And she was somehow related to Jeydon. He seemed to take after her father more than anyone else. Ayumi kicked at a log. It split open, revealing a honeycombed interior teeming with large termites. Ayumi stared down at the ants swarming over the ground in defense of their nest. She tried to imagine how it would feel to be an ant, guided by the scent of pheromones and direct stimuli. Maybe not such a bad existence. Then she leapt away and swore — a few termites had started crawling up her legs and were latching onto her with their sharp nippers.

No gun, no knives, no needles. No defense. Ayumi wondered whether having a pair of nippers herself would be more useful or irritating. She swatted a few termites off her pack and dragged it away from the log and the aggressive insects. There was nothing to do but open all the zippers and take inventory. She found enough food to last her two days and a few essentials as well as her poison. Her monofin was still there too, undamaged, if a little dirty.
Ayumi stalked around the campsite in indecision. She could either stay with a murderer in a small, vulnerable campsite and be attacked by termites, or set out on foot alone to find a troupe of undersupplied, lost journeyers and be attacked by mutants, savages, bandits and hunger and thirst. On the other hand, had she not pledged loyalty to her leaders in accepting this challenge? And was she to die on this island of recollections instead of in the peace of the Safety Zone?
Ayumi's resolution returned and she snapped the pack's zippers closed.

"I'm leaving," she said coldly at the tent, which seemed to be sulking. "Try not to shoot anyone on the island — they're probably your long-lost relatives too."
But before she could start her search, she picked up Jeydon's trail through the forest. She followed the broken twigs and patches of compacted leaves. She set thinking aside until a later date. Today she needed to find her father's corpse and reclaim her fate. Fine red orchids lined the way, some trampled and creased by Jeydon's hasty steps. The forest was perhaps even beautiful in daylight. Some of the humidity evaporated and the birds became more active for those few fleeting moments when the sun was overhead and the insects, stimulated by the heat, emerged, baring their fine black antlers to the light. Their activities disturbed small, intimate crevices of the forest floor.
This was the forest Ayumi remembered as a child.
"I knew you would be drawn back to me."
She shook off the memory and trod more vigilantly, slowing down somewhat.

The first clue was a single cartridge.
"I know you're there."
Ayumi brushed the leaves away and exposed the gleaming, cold handle of her Beretta Nano. It wasn't a pretty gun; compact and ugly, it was designed with only one purpose in mind.
She stood and moved a few steps forward. This was where...
"Ayumi!"
"He is my father!"

This trail was harder to follow than Jeydon's solid movements. Though made by two people, its effects were less profound. The footprints were subtle, the disturbances immaterial.
"You're hurting me!"
"This pain is nothing. Did I not teach you to overcome it? Did I not show you the secrets of the mind? Why did you leave me?"

Though he had been a large man in life, Ayumi's father's corpse seemed to have shrunk during the night. He lay on his back, glassy eyes staring upward, the dark dot on his forehead congealed to a crater. A few ants scurried away when Ayumi's shadow fell on them. She avoided his expressionless gaze and quickly ripped his pockets open. Her weapons spilled out, along with his own — a home-carved hilt stuck to a shard of a dagger, a stiff acupuncture needle with a leather sheath, a blue, opalescent amulet on a steel chain. Ayumi examined the amulet. It was strange that her father would carry a flat metal disk set with gems. Then Ayumi noted the sharpened edges and the silvery specks of blood on the back and gave a small smile. Not bad.
She turned the corpse over and searched all the clothes. She found only a crust of blood.

Ayumi gathered a bunch of orchids, which started to wilt almost immediately, and folded her father's hands over them. Before she left, she whispered a quiet prayer, though she was not sure how, and pocketed the amulet.

Ayumi washed her hands in the nearest stream.

Jeydon

I laid up in the tent trying to take a little nap but I constantly heard Ayumi stomping around, purposely annoying me. "Leave if you want Ayumi..I can't help this anymore.. I try to get to make you see that I'm not a bad guy but you just don't listen." I say. She didn't care a word of what I said. "I'm leaving." she huffed and walked off to what sounded as the east.

Finally I fell into a deep slumber.

Dream:
I woke up laying on a cold cement floor. "Not this again." I say to myself. I stood up and walked a little to the left and around a corner, Ayumi was laying on the floor with a large man over her. "Get away from her!" I scream. Not that I meant to, it sort of at this point didn't matter to me. My heart raced and I jumped ontop of the man. He turned around, it was her dad. "I killed you." I say to him as he turns to me with a smile. He winks and comes towards me but I back up.

"No, I'm afraid not." he says. Ayumi wakes up in a daze. I meddle for a gun that was suppost to be in my pocket. It wasn't there. "You looking for this?" he asks. My eyes strained in some terror. "What is happening?" I ask. "Come boy, come sit." He tells me. A table and chairs pop up out of no where. I am forced to sit and I feel restrained. "Ayumi come sit." he says to her. She walks over as if she actually loves him. "Yes daddy." she mumbles.

"This is no ordinary dream Jeydon. I did this. Ayumi is a smart girl to not like to many people, never get close to no one person if that makes any sense to you." he says. "Can Ayumi really see this like I can?" I ask. He nods as to say yes. "Of course I can stupid." she says as she looks at me with hatred in her eyes. "You killed my father!!!! How could you?!" she yells. "I had too Ayumi you must understand." I say. Her eyes turned red and she shot me with an arrow.

Waking up, I was in sweat again. "How?" I ask myself and wince. The pain hurt like hell. I pulled the arrow out of my arm. Ayumi came running up to the tent seeing the arrow being pulled out of my arm. "I'm sorry." she says. I nod and say not a problem. "I just don't know what came over me.. it was crazy and unbelievable.." she replies. I get up and go to a stream to help fix my wound.

Can i join.?