Chapter 1

   I stared at myself in the mirror. My mirror me stared straight back, wavy brown hair, blue eyes with black stripes in a pattern in the iris, unusual for a person. My pale and slender fingers traced my sharp jaw line, entranced by how differently I looked from my classmates. I turned away, grabbing my backpack from the bathroom floor as the school bell rang. I shoved my way through people, desperate to get to the parking lot before it was overcrowded and took me two hours to pull out in my car. I wasn't one of those people who had incredibly good luck. Mainly I was the odd one out.

    I heard my name being called and turned my head to see my science partner, Eric, rushing to make his way to me. I quickly tried to become invisible, hoping I had lost him in the crowd. Eric and I had been science partners for our three years in high school, and since the first day he had always had a terrible infatuation with me. He called it love, I called it hormones. Unluckily for me, he caught up.

    "Hey Constance," He said, trying to put on the smile that was supposed to be charming.

    "Uh, hey Eric. Can I help you with something?" The whole time I continued pushing myself through the horde of students, finally making it through the door and into the fresh air where I could breathe without cologne clogging my nose.

    "Yeah I was wondering if you wanted to come over to my place and study a little, you know, for the science test on Tuesday?"

    I turned to give him a slight upturn of my eyebrow. "What exactly is your idea of studying?" Immediately his cheeks flushed, red colliding with an overdone tan.

    "I'm not that guy."

    "Sure you aren't. Look Eric, I would study with you today but I've got to baby-sit Mrs. Terison's boy." I wandered past a couple of cars, finding my used Toyota quickly. I dug in my pocket for my keys.

    "Well then maybe I can come over there and we can study while you baby-sit."

    I shut my eyes tightly, exhaling sharply. I didn't want to be rude, but his attempts were using up all my patience. I took a deep breath and turned around. "Eric, I don't think that would help. It would distract me from actually babysitting the kid, which is the whole point. Maybe some other time." I unlocked my car and got in, shutting the door before he could reply. I put the key in the ignition, and then began to back out.

    My body slowly began to relax as I made my way towards Mrs. Terison’s house, glad that school was over. I lived in my own apartment. I had grown up an orphan, but when high school started the orphanage allowed me to live on my own, as long as I checked in with them once every month. I never knew what happened to my parents, and the orphanage never told me. As far as they were concerned, I had no long lost siblings or relatives. I was alone. I made money by working as a cashier for Barnes and Nobles, and babysitting.

    When I drove up to Mrs. Terison's place, the front door opened and Mrs. Terison came scurrying out. Mrs. Terison was a small slender woman, with shoulder length blond hair and hazel eyes, in around her mid-thirties. I climbed out of my car, wondering if something was wrong. But then I was showered with a million thank you’s.

    "Don't worry about it Mrs. Terison, I'm always happy to baby-sit Josh for you."

    She smiled. "You're such a sweet heart Constance. Now I'll be back at around ten, if that's all right. And Josh is getting ready to go to the park which is only a few blocks away, if you also don't mind taking him there."

    I shook my head. "Not at all. Have a good time on your date."

    Mrs. Terison smiled again and then disappeared into her car. I walked inside their house, greeting the warmth and shutting the door.

    "Josh?" I called. Footsteps thumped on the floor above and then he began to come down the stairs.

    "Hi Coni," he said, smiling to show me that his two front teeth were gone. He called me Coni because he couldn't fully pronounce my name.

    "Wow you lost them already!" I said enthusiastically. "Way to go buddy." I gave him a high five. "So," I said, noting his attire, "Are you ready to go to the park?"

    He nodded, jumping up and down, showing me all the energy he had built up inside of him. I laughed, extending my hand for his. Then we made our way to the park. It was crowded with kids when we got there, mainly all the ones that had just gotten out of school. There was a group of teenagers from my school over by the trees doing most likely drugs, and then there were the parents sitting on the benches making sure their kids didn't go over there. Before Josh could run off I pulled him close.

    "Don't go over by those boys ok? They're bad. And if anything happens just come to me, all right?"

    He nodded and then I let him run off towards the slides. I exhaled a long breath and plopped down on the grass, pulling up my knees and resting my arms on them. I saw a group of middle school kids enter the park too, and a couple of parents yelling at their kids not to eat the wood chips. I took off my sweatshirt as the air got hotter and ran my hand up my arm, across my tattoo. I had had the tattoo since I was born, or so I was told. I never remembered getting one, and I wasn't the type to get drunk at parties and go off and do something stupid like that, then wake up in the morning to find a surprise.

    The tattoo consisted of a bunch of symbols overlapping each other, symbols that I thought was a language I didn't know or recognized. The symbols wound themselves around my upper arm in a spiral form, extending from my shoulder to my elbow. Running through the symbols was something that resembled a wisp of smoke, and at the bottom by my elbow, the wisp of smoke formed into two pairs of blue eyes with black stripes.

    It had always made me curious as to why the eyes were the same as mine. Maybe when I was a baby my mom got it tattooed on me before giving me to the orphanage. I didn't spend much time on it; I already had too much to worry about. Suddenly there was a strange shift in the air, something that made me feel uneasy. I quickly looked to find Josh. He was climbing up the slide. I bit my lip and straightening my posture, looked around. But nobody else seemed to have felt the difference. I was just overreacting. Then the high schooler’s by the trees screamed and ran. I jerked myself up into the standing position. The parents did too just as the sky turned black.

    My mind was racing. It all seemed fine and then suddenly we were being attacked by animals, or were they humans? People were screaming, running in hysterics with their kids towards their cars. I grabbed my jacket off the ground, pulling it on as I ran towards the playground.

    "Josh!" I cried. I saw his figure immediately run towards me, tears streaming down his face. I embraced him tightly, picking him up in my arms and jogging towards the street. Bloodcurdling screams echoed behind me, and I didn't want to turn and see who had been killed. Then something caught my eye.

    I turned my head to see a black panther, its coat glinting, silky and sleek. It was running towards one of the high schooler’s. Then it pounced, and in midair, changed; transformed, into a human. Their legs were pulled up, arms spread and hands like claws. Their mouth was wide open, showing rows of pointy teeth. Black hair fell in his face, and his eyes. His eyes were blue with black stripes.

    I was too hypnotized that just as the boy pounced on the teenager, blood splattering, that something grabbed me from behind. I screamed, dropping Josh as I tried to keep my balance. I was thrown to the floor, the air getting knocked out my lungs. But somehow I got enough air back to scream at Josh.

    "Run home!" I took a big gulp of air. "Run home and lock all the doors and windows! Then hide! Run Josh please!" And that's exactly what he did.

    The boy I had seen kill the teenager before turned towards me, his pale skin almost translucent in the dark that had passed over the park. He blinked and suddenly hands grabbed my legs from behind, dragging me through the dirt towards the trees where we would be hidden. I screamed again, throwing my hands forward, my nails digging into the dirt, trying to find something, anything, to grab onto. But it was no use, the arms were too strong and they were moving far too fast.

    "Help me!" I screamed. "Help me!"

    But no one cared to try. They were too worried about saving themselves and their children. I was going to die. Tears spilled from my eyes. My arms flailed helplessly on the rough soil.

    "She's a noisy one," I heard one of my kidnappers say.

    Then the world went black.

   

 

 

Author's Note

I wrote the first twelve chapters a while ago, so when I continue on you might notice a change in the writing.

Reviews

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O_O Oh my GOD this is freaking epic!! I was SO not expecting that!!!!

I am DEFINITELY reading this!!