Young Writers Society

A cold breeze swiftly ran through my body, curling me up into a small, croissant-like posture, while the temperature of the chilling air condensed my breath into tiny visible droplets. I sensed a faint aroma of burnt toast, although that may have just been because I was hungry.

As I slowly regained consciousness, I tried to pull myself upwards with a frail amount of strength, getting myself off the cold and dirty surface of the floor.

I woke up with my head shoved in a box. Yes, a box. Like one of those cardboard boxes you get from your FedEx deliveries. Except, this one wasn’t crushed beyond the point of recognition.

I tried to take it off, but no matter how hard I pulled, it wouldn’t even budge. I eventually gave up and focused on other things like… where the heck am I?

The box that covered my head had two small cutouts right where my eyes were, revealing a dusk, claustrophobic cell with rusted metal bars that were illuminated by a tiny window on the other side of the room. The window was too high for me to escape, nor did I currently have the stamina to, and the bars were too close together for me to squeeze through, with a padlock cutting off any of my plans to get out.

I trudged around the room, examining other things inside. There was a bed with mold in the corner on a metal frame to support it, a toilet and sink that both looked like they were drained of water for a long time, and a musty carpet that had stains so old that there was no smell from them.

With not much I could do, I went to sleep.

A light singeing sensation could be felt on my right arm. It was the sunlight that was cast through the tiny window. I woke up, and when I looked at the ground, I saw a lunch tray with what seemed to be breakfast. I was excited to dig in, but then realized that I still had this big box on my head. I tried to take it off, but it wouldn’t budge. Again.

I tried to crush it, slam it(and subsequently my head) against the wall, and even soak it in water from the sink that was surprisingly still running a smooth and steady stream. It was useless. No matter what, this box was sturdier than anything I could throw at it.

The smell of the food was killing me. It smelled great—way better than any of my school lunches— and yet, I couldn’t even consume it.

I tried to see what the food was made of at least, but when I touched it, it was rock solid. Almost as if it wasn’t food. Almost as if… they were decoys made to fool me.

With very little strength remaining in me, I picked up what looked like a ham & cheese sandwich. beneath it, there was a rusted metal key. I quickly searched through all the other pieces of food. Orange slices? Nothing. Pop tart? Nothing. The slab of butter that’s way too big to put on any actual meal and is practically the symbol of American over consumerism and obesity epidemic? Nothing.

They all had nothing inside them, and they were all as solid as rock.

I scrambled and fumbled to get the key through to the other side of the metal bars, getting it closer to the padlock. Shoving it in, it made a promising click as I twisted the key, unlocking the cell door.

I escaped, trying to run away from this dystopian prison like building that had a shockingly similar layout to my school. There was surprisingly no security that was active or even visible. Not even a security camera in sight.

There were no other cellmates as well. I suddenly had doubts, wondering why someone like me was placed in such an ominous place. That thought was short lived though, getting pushed back as I prioritized escaping this complex first.

The door to the outside was surprisingly easy to find, with the building only having one way to go in every turn. I escaped, pushing the door open to see… nothing.

I could make out faint silhouettes of buildings, but it was dark outside. The only thing that was illuminated was the Brobdingnagian building that I just escaped from.

I tried to clear my eyes, thinking it was just because my eyes weren’t adjusted to the dark.

Well, my eyes wereindeed not well adjusted to the dark, because my vision got clearer as I refocused my eyes. However, what I saw wasn’t a silhouette of a city. It was a remnant of a city.

All the buildings were either demolished or badly destroyed, shattered shards of glass and broken off pieces of concrete were everywhere.

The air was colder than the inside of the building, and not a single sign of life could be spotted. I tried to see if I could recognize anything, or find any hints about my whereabouts, but all the signs on the buildings were in a language I could not read.

I walked down what seemed to be a once bustling road with a plentiful amount of shops and restaurants, but they were destroyed beyond recognition. As I reached a bridge that was standing over a wide river, I sensed something behind me.

It felt…

Familiar…

I looked behind me, to see a child around the same age as me, also with a cardboard box stuck on his head. Luckily, it wasn’t that goddamn shadow figure that I grew to oH so lOVe anD AdoRE.

“Hey! Who are you? Are you okay?” I yelled.

The child stood still, ominously looking towards my direction.

“Hey…” I said, walking up to him.

“H… hello…” He replied.

“Do you know where we are? Why are we even here? Do you have contact with your parents?” I bombarded him with questions.

“Uhm… I don’t know… Sorry.”

“Well, i guess there’s nothing much you can do, huh… no problem, don’t sweat over it! My name’s Nathan. Yours?”

“Gregory… call me Greg.”

“Okay Greg, do you know what happened to… this?” I said, pointing at my head and the massive cardboard box stuck to it.

“No idea. I also had that thing on me when I arrived here.”

“Well, yeah that checks out I guess… wait, you also know about the shadow?”

“Oh, you also experienced it right? Everyone that comes here seems to have a similar phenomenon happen to them before being dragged here.”

“Then, you also saw it in your dreams?”

“Kind of. I saw it in pictures that were taken of me. A little shadow standing in the background, appearing ever so closer in every picture. Until-” 

He stopped, shivering from both the cold of the night’s gust and fright from the shadow.

“Wait, you said everyone else. There are other people here?” I asked, changing the subject to take his(and my) mind off… that thing.

“Yeah, there’s a whole camp of us. There are some that have been here longer and they know way more about this place than me. It’s been barely a week since I came here, so I’m relatively new.”

“Well, can you lead them to me?”

“Sure. Follow me.” Greg said.

I followed him through a narrow alleyway, through nooks and crannies, dirt and grime, stench and puddles, into a series of tents with light that were barely visible around the corner. It was civilization. Well, technically the entire city itself can be called civilization, but you get the point.

Without warning, Greg stopped in his tracks, turning around to me as if to tell me something. I stopped my footsteps as well, wondering why he suddenly stopped. Maybe there’s something wrong with the camp, maybe he’s reluctant to introduce me to the others when he’s so new himself. I thought, pessimistically.

“I… I’m sorry.” He said, shaking both his voice and body.

“For what?”

Without a word, he raised a pistol up to my forehead. Before I could say anything back-

*Bang*